One Part Inspiration...

A few weeks ago, I had a once-in-a-lifetime-event.  It was a side-by-side Swedish massage; shared with a friend of mine who was coming to visit relatives.  She called me from out of province to see if I would be interested in helping her to use up a coupon she'd bought online.  It took me about two seconds to say "I'm in".  Neither one of us knew what we were "In" for. I got a hint when I made the phone call to reserve the date.  Since she didn't live here, it made sense for me to make the arrangements.  I called the number she'd given me.  A man answered. He didn't speak very well English.  I told him what I was calling for and he said " No problem, we can do that for you " and then " When would you like to come? "  I asked if we could have a morning appointment.  He immediately said " No, we don't do massages in the morning. "   " Well when could we come ?"  I asked.  " Can you come in the ...

Sometimes we have a date night. And we always want to do something fun for a buck or two. So we have big discussions about our options. Not too long ago, it happened that we had a bonus date night. We were talking about what we should do that evening, over a nice cup of tea. I said I had planned to colour my hair. My husband asked if I wanted him to help me. I said sure, and then half-joking asked him if he wanted me to help him colour his hair too. To my surprise, he agreed. I usually buy the same colour - for consistency of results. However, because I am a magazine fan, and had kept seeing this other product consistently recommended on the " Best Colourer for your Buck " lists, I had bought that brand instead. I chose a colour which I thought was fairly close to the one I usually buy. It said " Dark Auburn ". We decided that since my husband's hair was so much shorter than mine, we should start on his first. I applied the colour and started the timer. It didn...

It is the time of year when I begin thinking about Christmas gifts. I always start by trying to figure out whether or not I want to make gifts. This is always a big dilemma. Will I really save money by spending 150$ on craft supplies to make gifts for 10 000 of my closest friends? Or would I be better to make a list, and see what I could come up with in the 'ready-made' category. There was a time when I combed the library and magazines for ideas on things I could make which would require few supplies, little skill, and yet would make maximum impact. Over the years, I have decoupaged, painted, baked, and hot-glued my way through the season. One year, I bought 100 pounds of rice, thinking that I would just quickly whip up magic bags. What was I thinking? A magic bag requires sewing. Sewing machines and I are not friends. We ate rice a lot the following year to use up the other 98 pounds. I freely admit, that when it comes to making things, I am not very talented. For one thing, i...

About a week ago, we were at The Pokeaway. My job was to sweep up and tidy the corners. There's so much dust and dirt and dry wall kibbly bits and sawdust, and nails. I fashioned a corner-getter from a rogue bit of wood and got as much as I could. I was being very careful to avoid the nails. On one of my trips back from the dumpster, I found one sticking out of the concrete. Unfortunately, I didn't see it before I stepped on it. It went through my shoe, into my foot. Man that hurt! I ignored it as best as I could, but by the evening, I was hobbling around. I fought off the infection by soaking it in epsom salts and putting Aloe Vera gel on it. Two days later, I was able to wear shoes again. However, all week, it felt like a combination of a giant bruise and walking on a frozen pea. Yesterday my foot didn't hurt as bad. Perhaps that's because when my husband was taking down the board I was holding, which were held the French Doors in place while the silicone ...

I believe in celebrating my accomplishments. I generally try to make sure my celebrations include food. Such was the case last week after I had gone to the local post-secondary institution, and presented a lecture on " Music Therapy in Dementia Care . Everything went swimmingly. The students were enthusiastic participants. The power point presentation went off without a hitch. I punctuated the more technical information with video (also went over big) and pictures which showed the work of the various groups I run. I have been invited to share my Music Therapy knowledge for about 10 years in this place. Each class of Registered Care Attendants who comes through the program has been through one of my lectures. Over the years, I have changed from black and white overheads to colored ones; and not too long ago, I upgraded to a memory stick which holds my information. With it, I can just plug in to their machine and look very techno-girl. My history with doing this lecture in...

For Christmas one year, I bought my husband a clock radio/phone. It was a sacrifice, but I have never been sorry. I have privately congratulated myself many times for a good consumer decision. The clock radio has two alarms, so that, if say on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, you have to get up at 6:30 and on Tuesday and Thursday you have to get up at 7:00, the clock doesn't have to be reset. How clever! The phone also has a few fantastic features. Back in the day, it was pretty high-tech. The best feature is that it is an 'old fashioned' phone - one that plugs into the jack. You can't move around the house with it. This means you will never have to search for it under your son's bed, where he put it just before he went to sleep - four days ago. It means, that if the power goes out, the phone stays connected and you can call Hydro to let them know you're in the dark. It means that the phone will not die on you mid-way through your conversation with your sister abou...

On the reason why I don't take risks. I usually get hurt. Like the time my friend and I decided to jump off the moving hay wagon and walk the rest of the way. I paid for that with a broken rib and a bruised ego. Like the time I decided to conquer the water slides. As I went down the second one, I felt myself flying down out of control and put my arm out to slow my progress, which resulted in a muscle wrench so strong, I could hardly breathe for three weeks. Like the time I decided to be a kid again and sail down the ramp while 'riding' the grocery cart. I ended up with a bruise in the middle of my stomach which exactly matched the shape of the coin drop in the cart. Like the time I thought I'd be a smart Alec and take the car out of gear when my sister got out to talk to her husband. The car very nearly missed the tree. I have now added the dangerous job of vacuuming to the list of 'risky business'. For the second straight year I have a broken toe [albeit a dif...

The real estate agent had arranged for us to see five places on that day of acreage hunting. We looked at the first two in short succession. The visits were not long. Basically we were just interested in seeing what was available in our price range. All of them were very small, but they boasted of great things. We saw the first two places in quick succession. We were at the third place longer. It wasn't that we fell in love with the place. It just took longer to extricate ourselves from the event that took place. On the real estate advertisement, we saw that it said there were three bedrooms. Three bedrooms would work better for our family. We walked into the house and right away we were in the kitchen. We took some time to check out the cupboards and the dishwasher, and the sub-compactor. Then we moved into the living room area. What was interesting was the "office" at the end of the living room. It actually was the entrance, but they had blocked the door an...

As I was doing some clean up today, I took the paper garbage down to the burn pile to get rid of it. It had been piling up for some time and there was quite a load. Last year at this time, we were using the wood stove to get rid of burnables. However, in order to renew our insurance we had to have 'a guy' come and look at it. He took about five minutes (and our 135$) to tell us not to use the stove - even though it works fine, he told us that there was "this and that" wrong with it and therefore, in his informed (and expensive) opinion, it was best to let it become a place to showcase collectibles. Therefore I am resigned to using the burn pile instead. Every once in a while, I become more environmentally aware and recycle but today, I needed to get rid of the garbage without making another stack somewhere else in the house. As I set the fire, I thought back a few months ago when my husband went away for the weekend. I began cleaning and got so" fired...

There I was the other night in a dead sleep. It was about four in the morning to be exact(ish). I woke up suddenly. It's hard to sleep with the smell of fresh baked bread wafting up the stairs, under the doors and into your bedroom. Sleepily, I realized that when I had set the bread maker "Delay" button to 6 hours, I miscalculated. The bread maker would not start at four(ish) in the morning. No, no no! That's when the cycle would end! Sometimes being organized can backfire on you. I drifted in and out of sleep. My nostrils were like little snooze buttons. Every time I would go back to sleep, the snooze button would go off and I would come awake again. Sniffing the air. It smelled heavenly. But it was definitely not conducive to being in a somnolent state. After two hours of hitting the olfactory snooze button, it was time to get up. I am sure that my co-workers wondered why I was dragging myself around the next day. It would be deceitful to tell you that this is the f...