out like a lamb ...

and so march declines and april burgeons, squelching through slush and mud and notrain notsnow, hoods drawn and footsteps quick as can. umbrellas blossoming in a vain attempt to subjagate the prairie wind.

clouds scudding away to the east, faces lifted to glaringly cool sunlight. a primitive assertion that hibernation has ended. a quick nap or two, all that is left of the darktime.

fugitive drifts neath the pines dissolving. fragile shoots nestling in the undercarpet of last year's lawn. new growth curled around itself engorging thin casings. perennials thrusting for the light and heat of longer days.

voices strident with the longnight soften, warming timbres deepening laughter. touchy feely time approaching, reconnecting.

... the deck will be up soon

happy anniversary to me

today is 1 year in my by now not so new job. thank the hundred little gods. to be able to get up in the morning and look forward to going to work is a rare thing that I will continue to cherish. as with so many other things in our lives we truly do not appreciate how important it is to enjoy your work. having to drag your ass to a job that you detest, either because of the work itself, the people or the environment takes a serious toll on a body in so many ways... the dread factor kicks in.

no more dread factor for me.

AND it's friday - who hoo.

light after darkness

frosty splotches pancaking the cement
wet splooshes as they devolve to slush
hugging your soles slogging on home.
the door breathing freshness in
waking after winter
opening windows
shaking rugs
singing
light

spring has sprung a leak

this morning it was "it's raining, it's pouring"
and this aft it's "frozen rain, come again"

ahhh - but it is still SO much better than 20 below.

spring is supposed to be damp - green things need moisture to grow, it helps thaw the ground.

so instead of complaining - get an umbrella, dig out the galoshes (rainboots for you youngsters) and the slicker (raincoat) and start singin in the rain/snow/sleet/mush ...

it's good for the sole - heh heh heh

Mon after work

why do complete strangers talk to me? especially strangers that are STRANGErs. i don't mind chatting with the occasional lonely on the bus, or waiting in a line. i am quite happy to exchange how-dos with street musicians, etc. i don't even mind short convos with the indigenous passersby on the concrete smoking lounge outside the pub. HOWEVER, if i am sitting on my front step, reading a book, looking all "leave me alone" ... why wHy WHY do they insist on perforating my little bubble of personal happy space!

Do i have a welcome nimbus surrounding me? Is there a welcome mat at my feet? Is there a big freaking neon sign above me that says "BOTHER HER" that only I cannot see? Anywhere, anywhere at all, does it say > talk to this woman - she only appears to be busy - that is an illusion - she is actually sitting and waiting for the strange to strike up a conversation?

No, it does not.

phew, all better now.

minor bits . . .

stephanie should not have been sent home
migraine
stiffachey
banking
finished 2 books
visit with dad & viv
watered plants
moved Lu's car to nickster's
watched Eragon @ lu's
horizontal toss
up too early - stupid birds
dishes
successful burn - thank you mikey
org tasks
the tire
hot turkey sandwich
groceries done
garbage
cornerstore
bbq time - taaasty!
asskickin' in canasta
crash
dishes
read on deck
brush cat
hard core hygiene cubicle clean time
laundry - this'll take all nite.
3 useless trips to the laundry room
now ...

still to do :
laundry 3 loads x 2up2down (5trips if i'm lucky)
supper
some pampering perhaps

womanhood . . .

f#*%in yay.

24 things I thought would be fun but weren't

idea c/o schmutzie & abigail: here's my list, my only problem was limiting it to 24 and changing names to preserve both the guilty and the innocent.

1. the multitudinous hair scare affairs (a list all on it's own). short, long, permed, shaved, semi shaved, coloured (platinum to blue black and even blue). and streaked and streaked and streaked. now no perm, naturally curly, long and just enough clairol to keep the white wings and the elvira streak at bay.

2. not really more fun, but faster so I could go and have some fun:plucking the black hairs on my chinny chin chin instead of bleaching them.

3. throwing a dollar's worth of fingerling firecrackers into grandpa's shed. lit. i hid in the horse pasture for a long long time.

4. deciding that it was best to go commando under my wedding gown in the CHURCH - and NOT telling the bridesmaids before they helped to get my train into the limo.

5. attempting to walk accross the 6 foot high monkeybars on the tarmacked schoolgrounds in Swan River the first day of summer vacation, when I knew I was not supposed to. ... broken wrist, cast came off in mid september.

6. got stuck on the tow rope at Mt. Argosy and couldn't get off at the bunny hill (1st time skiing), got off at TOP of tow, and decided to "snowplow" all the way down. hit a small jump on the intermediate slope and barely managed to stay upright, lost a pole and straight armed into the retaining wall at the bottom. more like "snowball"

7. attempting to launch on waterskis while SITTING ON A WOODEN DOCK!

8. giving myself a homemade tatoo, and going over it 3 times for good measure.

9. riding a motorcycle in a skirt and 5" spikes, and forgot about the exhaust pipe. thank the hundred little gods I wasn't wearing nylons.

10. marrying him ... and him ... and almost marrying them.

11. buying my son a skateboard.

12. piercing my daughter's ears

13. having a waterballoon fight with the balloons I found in my dad's sock drawer. they were great, toss em off the garage and they bounced if you hit the grass. latex is tuff.

14. setting up a "travois" - without taking into account how far the horse could reach with his kick.

15. talking my sister into sticking a fork into the kitchen plugin when i was about 8. actually that was fun

16. deciding that supersliders were actually made for downhill.

17. drinking 28 shots of tequila in 2 hours on my 28th birthday. el stupido!

18. attepting to teach my cat Snooper to swim.

19. taking turns shooting each other with BB guns

20. "borrowing" the tribike to go to the store - and driving by my dad who had forbidden it on the street on the way there.

21. attaching a corn on the cob to a fishing line and dragging it behind the car down 8th Street in Saskatoon. When the police want to know what you are doing . . . "Trolling for pigs."

22. zoomers for 2 days before and during the ACDC concert. i did WHAT?

23. volunteer to help a friend move to find out that the old place is on the 3rd floor and so is the new place - in separate buildings . . . and there is no elevator.

24. while working nightshift, to catch up on my sunbathing by going to sleep in the yard around 11am and waking up at 2:30pm ... in mid july.

spring is sprung, the grass is riz, I wonder where the flowers is?

an old old old little bit of fluff that my mommy used to recite. along the same lines as "does eat oats" (Doe as in female deer) , and if you don't recognize it, not to worry, you have not missed the crowning piece of literature from the 30s & 40 s. it just a bit of fun. it does however, make me smile whether I hum it, sing it or even let it trip through the brain (today it's a short trip)

does eats oats
and goats eats oats
and little lambs eat ivy

a kid'll eat ivy too
wouldn't you (in a light an lilting sort of tone)

happy birthday to Murray - he's 24 today

today is one of those days when you just cannot get away from your age. usually I don't really care, and i am actually looking forward to 50, i'd like to skip to there right now (8 years to retirement once i get there and my kitchen reno might be done by then) but today my youngest turned 24. we got him a spiderman cake and took him to the video arcade yesterday - all the kids from age 6 to 45 had a good time.

St. Paddy's is over for another 363 days ... this year i changed the tradition and met the crew at Ohee's for lunch and a couple of pints and then spent the rest of the day with the grands. it is my sincere wish that the crew had a blast and that their collective hangover wasn't too too bad :)

wow, March is almost over ... can you believe it?

alone . . .

the onset of spring stirs the blood, the anima rises, especially if you’ve survived yet another hibernation through a northern winter – mayhap that is causing my mental regurgitation of the “could of, should of, would ofs”. i am alone but not lonely, though some people tell me that I am just kidding myself. i believe they are wrong. when i need company i visit with friends (i consider myself very lucky to have a double handful), i go out and be with crowds of strangers (it's great and i make new friends) or i have people over to my place. sure there is the occasional urge for a twosome, but not for an everyday permanent presence, been there, done that, bought the t-shirt (and it was fairly expensive – rated as haute couture).

from the 16 to almost 46 - i have lived alone exactly 5 months. and i liked it. alot. right now i have a housemate (son) , but he is looking to move in the next 6 months or so i think, and that's ok.

observing the swirl of human partnerships around me, i wonder why i choose to remain outside. i have a few friends who seem to have made the same choice i have (or was the choice made for us by experience?) there are short spans where i might want to be part of a couple again but they pass fairly quickly… like a hangover. i used to believe that we were designed to be in pairs. now – not so much. individuals are meant to be individuals, though some are driven pushed pulled towards partnership for a plethora of reasons : love desire fear security tradition habit, just to name the basics. i think we all have to understand that partner relationship which can only be done through experience, but it is not forever for most.

sifting through the detritus, ghosts of “what once was” rise from the misshapen lumps of half-forgotten remnants littering my emotional landscape. 2 marriages, 2 kids, 2 grandkids, and a couple of finite engagements, lost & refound friends, school, work, career … it took me until I was 42 to have a partnership that ended with my heart bruised yet my dignity intact, but it still ended. maybe now that i have figured out how to do that, i no longer need to practice.

love can be blind but doesn’t have to be. i know it’s not the peter principle that holds me back. i’m not afraid of commitment and i don’t need someone else to provide my security. i’ve transcended my habit of choosing “bad boys” or people who “need” me. as for tradition – fuck it. perhaps I have simply lost the desire to share my whole life with that one “other” – and selfish as that may seem, that is not necessarily a bad thing.

so for those out there who keep asking why am i alone? maybe it’s because you’re ready.

... the ides of March

contrary to popular belief, this is not to be confused with superstitiously unlucky days like Friday the 13th's - however in the calendar in which "ides" originates there are 8 months whose "ides" fall on the 13th of the month, so if that occurs on a friday, it could be both the "ides" and unlucky. It was certainly an unlucky day for Caesar who should perhaps have been more discriminating in his choice of buddies.

the actual term "ides" purportedly comes from Romulus' (supposed founder of rome) first roman calendar. whichever twisted puppy invented this particular piece of work, he must not have had enough to do since trying to figure the date becomes a labrynthian task. each month revolves around 3 special days "Kalends, Nones, & Ides" each of which served as a reference point for counting the other days:

Kalends (1st day of the month)
Nones (the 7th day in march, may, july, and october; the 5th in the other months)
Ides (the 15th day in march, may, july, and october; the 13th in the other months)

the remaining, everyday days of the month were identified by counting backwards from the Kalends (origin of calendar - means account book and the first of the month id when bills came due even then), Nones, or the Ides. march 3 would be V Nones > 5 days before the Nones (the roman method of counting days was inclusive) in other words, the Nones would be counted as one of the 5 days.

apparently Romulus didn't like the latter half of any month, since all of the reference days appear between the first and the 15th. this system was also used in the Julian calendar (45 bce) and was in common use through the middle ages right up to the renaissance.

and if that isn't confusing enough, how about the egyptian calendar: the ancient egyptians used a calendar with 12 months of 30 days, for a total of 360 days/year. around 4000 B.C. they added 5 extra days at the end of the year to equate with the solar year. these five days became a festival because it was thought to be unlucky to work during that time.(still trying to find out the why of that one)

the egyptians had actually calculated that the solar year was actually closer to 3651/4 days, but instead of using a single leap year system, they let the 1/4 day accumulate. after 1,460 solar years, or four periods of 365 years, 1,461 egyptian years had passed. this means that as the years passed, the egyptian months fell out of sync with the seasons, so that the summer months eventually fell during winter. only once every 1,460 years did their calendar year coincide precisely with the solar year. but not to worry they had a separate religious calendar based on the lunar cycle, and christmas didn't exist yet :)

wed nes day

holy jumpin' catfish batman - i just dumped an entire big robin's mug of coffee on my office carpet! what a mess, soaked as much of it up as i can with some old newspapers.... and the day was going so well!

slipped on ice on way to work
sun is hiding behind clouds and very windy
only had one smoke left
health insurance misfiled my claim for the 2nd time in 3 days
bank processed chq dated for 22nd on 12th and won't have the $back in my account till thurs.
my office chair tips me exactly the wrong way to put pressure on already compressed disk
a relative is quite ill - affecting my kids
banged my forehead on my desk when cleaning up coffee mess(at least it wasn't my nose)
and to add insult to injury - farted in the elevator -

on the bright side my friend Theresa took me to lunch and it was lovely

bloody marvelous ...

sunday was kickback and try and figure out how to get my computer to burn a video file onto a DVD that will play in my DVD player. ^*$%#&!@! remember - breathe - so I have now tried 4 - yes 4 burning programs. SuperDVD, Nero, Sonic, WinDVD ... I have however accumulated much info on the manufacture and quality ratings of Cd and DVD blanks and nice new set of shiny coasters. i am not usually technologically baffled but by noon yesterday i had pretty much given up. which truly sucks because i purchased a shiny new DVD player over a month ago SPECIFICALLY so I could watch all the stuff i've downloaded on my tv instead of my laptop.
it was also a very good excuse to sit on my deck and finish one of the books i am currently reading (usually 3 or 4 on the go).

ahh the sun this morning was just bloody marvelous. enough puddles to play in and crackle that fragile ice that forms just around the edges but not wide enough to impede my progress. work went along at a good pace and now i'm done.

smells like genius.

la la la

the boyo isn't home, the people are sending phones to voicemail, and the pc just is not holding my attention. the great outdoors is a calling and I think I'll answer. (there's this great freakin HUGE puddle at the end of the block i REALLY need to go jump in. cheers

that new car smell ...

it makes me sneeze! went out new car shopping with Lu today ... good grief charlie brown ... no wonder I don't have a car. Let's see, we looked at a Kia Rio5 @ 22K, sporty but not enough front seat leg room and the Spectra was slightly larger but very "family car" (both have 5yr 100,000K bumper to bumper warranty with roadside assistance) though there will be a "Sport" limited edition coming in in a few weeks, A VW Jetta - great car, solid with nice lines, but more than 28K, a Toyota Matrix (you'd think they'd have better colour selection) which was nice but it uses an alternative gas in the tires (good idea but what happens when you're out in the boonies?) the Honda Fit was best overall, a zippy little sport, great mileage, nice ride, good pick up for a 4 banger, lots of cargo room, much space in front, back and middle. great versatility for seat configuration and a great metallic copper but only a 3 year 60K warranty (bells and whistles but no sunroof). the Honda Civic was nice, had the goodies but though a 2 door looks nice, not too practical when hauling more than 1 tall or descrepit passengers. much for Lu to ponder over.

personally I like the pontiac Solstice ragtop - sweet ride - impractical but a curvy beauty she is.

my day off (everyone else's friday ;)

pints with the crew last evening, Robin's birthday, much talking and more laughing and supper was delish.it was so beautiful that many of us were mindful of the need for the deck and the pic-a-nic tables - but they won't be showing up for quite some time yet. at 4 am the geese flying back to Northern Sask woke me up with their honking ... i don't care what the groundhog says, spring is officially here, went immediately back to sleep with a smile in my mind.

woke up at 8:30, fed the cat, had some yogurt and opened the windows to let in the beautiful spring air and sunshine - all fresh and clean - decided it was my day off and promptly went back to nap with the fresh air wafting across my toesies. stupid phone ringing (i am genetically incapable of letting a phone ring - i have a primal prerogative that requires me to determine WHO IS IT?) up now, almost 10, did some chores, handful of little ones, made lunch, did some work on the PC, watered some but not all of the plants, and talked on the phone.

round teatime i walked over to Deb's and managed to circumnavigate all the puddles and most of the slushy stuff, had a coffee and conversation, delightful. walked to Luanne's the long way - just wanted to be outside, played some cards, stood out on her balcony and did some star gazing - man are there a lot of satellites up there now - and has anyone else noticed that the star at the left uppermost point of Orion seems preternaturally bright these days? came home and now it's off to beddy bye. ciao

it's friday, I mean my friday, your thursday ...

it's my friday because I have an EDO tomorrow (earned day off) so I get a long weekend.

yesterday I got all caught up on the backlog at work so today I am working on today's incoming. who hoo!

this morning when I woke up at 7am, the sun was shining in my window - ahhhh HUGE sigh of relief, and a smile crept over my face like the grinch when his heart grew. auto sloughing of winter doldrums began. the walk to work was a stroll into the light, and the grin grew. by the time i got to the office it was cheshire.

having reclaimed my generally optimistic outlook, I decided to see if I could wear my glasses today. a light graze of the shnoz proved painless, the bruising just a faint olive tinge under the skin ... what they hey, put them on - a little uncomfortable but no real pain. 3rd homerun of the day and it was only 9am.

it's now 1:30 and the sun shone all through lunch (I was out doing a little goddess worship at noon time) amanda & chris are out unplugging their street drain in an atttempt to allieviate the 3 inches of water already starting to pool at the curb. It's the first spring in the new house so it's better safe than sorry (personally, I think they like to play in the puddles too). I am quite sure that the streets on my way home will be mush when it's time to slog on, but it does not matter because I like to jump in the puddles too. (I told you before I prefer to stay 8 years old).

think I'll get a light jacket and sit on my deck and read a bit - hallelujah the hundred little gods are smilin' on me today.

do you know where your head is?

The other day I dropped something when i was cooking and made that fatal GRAB to get it before it hit the floor... and smoked my nose right off the metal edged kitchen counter so hard I ended up on my ass, crying like a baby. almost knocked myself unconscious. BUT i whacked it in exactly the right place not to cause any internal damage, just some superficial swelling and an immensely (ha ha) tender proboscis. can't wear the glasses. maybe i've managed to smooth out the bump i used to have there? i'm just glad that all I got was swelling around the eyes and some slight bruising that is just now coming out across the bridge. still freakin hurts though, and i keep grazing it. maybe it will cure my snoring - now that would be a miracle.

Here are my grandkids riding their bikes new years day :)

Seth:


Devi:

cat talent

I received the most hilarious little video in my mail today. unfortunately I have no idea how to post the video to this blog. please help me.

and schmutzie to the rescue, thank youtoob
the cause of the mysterious water bills ... a cat that knows how to flush the toilet, so it can chase the water all day :)

but because the video is not originally mine, youtube won't let me use it. it was funny while it lasted.

the third of the third ...

okay then, was back to work this week - and glad to be there. people starvation had set in solid. it's amazing how just seeing your regular people makes you feel better! still tired all the time though, get home and sleep for 3 hours (which doesn't do a hell of a lot for the sleep pattern) but once i get off the rest of my meds it'll get better. or at least that's the "plan"

my friend Renee wanted to go to "Change for Change" at the exchange (say that 6 times fast) a multi band/dj shindig for a good cause, and a good time had by all. just close your eyes and let the music breathe through you. aahhhhh. soooo much better ... heartbeat of the world ...

love the drum and bass. i was one of the "just wanna boogie woogie oogie till i just can't boogie no more" girls. big surprise there... all music is danceable - is that not the point? a good groove is the physical articulation of exactly who you are at that moment in time, inside is out and the spirit is movin'.

had a great sleep. suffice it to say that I woke up to a wondrous morning. hope everyone has a brilliant day.