May 29th, 2009 @ 9:59 pm
Hey, guess what? My parents are currently on their way to Ireland. Can you believe that? They didn’t even take ME! Humph! I hope they see lots of faeries and green space and hills and rocks and shamrocks and lots of cool things. They’re even going to be somewhere near where my Grandfather was from (though I do not know how close, or if they’ll get a chance to visit the town).
I can’t chronicle their entire trip but I can do a before and after, so I can see if they’re any different when they get home. (You know, like if they start to turn into leprechauns and stuff!) So here I am with my wonderful parents last night (even if they aren’t taking me with them!)
It’s going to be weird not being able to just phone up my mum and speak to her whenever I want to for the next while. I’m a big Mummy’s Girl and I like talking to her every few days (once a week even). But I made sure that Shawn and I stopped over the night before they left so that I could give them a hug. I don’t plan on anything happening, but you never know these days, right? And it’s the farthest any of us have ever flown so of course it’s nerve wracking!
I hope they have the best time. This is their dream vacation and they deserve it. Especially after all that’s happened in the last year! I hope that they relax and enjoy themselves and all that they’ll see for the first time. I am jealous of their trip, and I HOPE that I won’t have to wait until I’m retired to get to Ireland, but I think it’s fitting that they get there before I do.
We’ll see how my Super7 ticket does tonight. Who knows? Maybe Shawn and I will join them next week. Heh.
In other news – I have awesome new shoes and now I have to bombard you all with photos of them!
Not only are they super sparkly, they are all soft and ballet slipper-leathery on the inside. So comfortable! Except the back of the left shoe gave me a blister and cut into my heel. Rude! That’s more my foot’s fault than the shoe’s fault because I have a weird bump back there. Ah, well. And I think they look nice on my piano. 
It’s rain, rain, rain over here right now. And cool. I heard we’re supposed to be getting a cold and wet summer. Which is lousy, because we’ve actually had a spring for the first time in goodness knows when and it’s been so nice and sunny. I like the sun, I don’t like the heat. Ironic, I know. I’d like the sun to come back out again. I still have gardening and dirt digging to do and I do NOT want to do it in the rain. Yuck!
May 28th, 2009 @ 12:17 pm
It’s been drawn to my attention that it’s been 10 days since I have posted anything. I guess that’s true. I don’t really have much to talk about, or at least, I have things but they’re not all that exciting.
Mostly, I get home and I am exhausted. We figure out what to eat for dinner, I eat, watch some Angel and then fall asleep. I haven’t even been turning my computer on when I get home. THAT’S how exhausted I am. Of course I am almost at the end of Angel. I have about 4 or 5 episodes left before the series ends. And yes, I have watched all this before – when it was on TV. But I started watching all 5 seasons over again over a month ago. It’s something to do, and it’s commercial free!
I could tell you about the stupidity I run into at my job. But I don’t like to talk too much about work on here, especially if it’s stupidity, because that can just get you into a ton of trouble, right? I’m not the one who’s stupid here. There was a story about my boss and his lost blackberry. A week later they were reunited when someone brought me the phone. I had a block put on it by the cell phone company so that if some nefarious person were to find it they couldn’t wrack up the charges. Though a week later, while my boss was out of the building at a 3-hour meeting, the phone was found. So in my typical cheeky fashion, I set out to try and find a ribbon or bow to adorn it for when he returned. I got the block off of the phone (having to phone the person who could do it, who had left early for an appointment, to call the company right as she was about to enter the appointment and unblock it), I riffled through my boss’ bag to see if by change the charger was there (it was) and though I didn’t find a bow – I did fashion a flower out of pink tissue paper, and someone gave me a red ribbon with a bell on it. So when the big boss returned to his office I had the phone charging, unblocked and festively waiting for him!
At least I didn’t Tinker Bell it, right?
Or, I could tell you about how I wiped out and just about turtled on the sidewalk in front of the office on Monday. I was leaving to get some Ben & Jerry’s ice cream with my work-bffs Elise, Maureen and Johanne when my foot caught a caved-in part of the sidewalk (Montreal is riddled with pot holes in it’s streets and on its sidewalks. I hate it here, did I mention that?) and my left ankle twisted, my knee twisted and yet I seem to have fallen on my right knee/leg/elbow/wrist and suddenly I was thinking “Huh, I can see the sky and the tree, weird.” And almost in slow motion everyone’s head just came into my line of sight – ABOVE me. It was like those scenes on TV where someone is lying on the table before surgery or something and you get their point of view of all the doctors staring down at them. Well, it was like that. And I hurt. And random people on the street stopped to help me get up as Maureen and Johanne (I think it was them) helped lift me back to standing.
And of course, this was noon and so every student, employee and other random person out on their lunch break got to watch me wipe out on the cement. It was lovely. And how much I hurt this week because of that fall is incredible. I hurt in places I didn’t know I even bothered when I fell. As I told my friends, I think I did about 15 Cirque du Soleil moves as I turtled on Monday. Ow.
I did get ice cream though! And I finally discovered one that I like (because I am not a fan of ice cream). It’s called, um, something about whirrled peace. It has caramel in it. Yum.
Also, Annie’s blood test results came in on Monday and her liver levels are bad (not really a surprise due to the many years she’s been on cortisone pills). So we are going to have to change her food and likely end up with new (EXPENSIVE) pills. But I will try and stave off the pill part as much as I can. I don’t have $125 a month for pills. Yikes! Plus she’s not showing any signs of having anything wrong, so I am not worried about her. I call her my Curious Case of Annabelle Lappie since she seems to act younger the older she gets.
What else? Hmm, nothing really. I had a dentist appointment this morning – still no cavities, so my record holds. I will be getting a night guard thing for my teeth so that I stop grinding them while I sleep. Hoping that will stop the immense pain in my jaw near my ears – which I always thought was sinus related, but per my ENT specialist guy it’s TMJ and I need that guard. So we’ll see how that goes. Also, we’ll see if my insurance will cover it because it’s $475. Ick.
Apparently May is an expensive month.
I can’t believe Monday is JUNE! Where did May go?? I should have noticed it much more with the amount of money I was spending. Yeech.
See? Not so much with the exciting or interesting. But I’m home today, so I thought I would update.
May 18th, 2009 @ 10:01 am
EVERY weekend should be a LONG weekend!
Saturday - we buried my grandmother and the rain – the downpour of rain – was kind enough to hold off until we were all in our cars leaving the cemetery and heading back to our place for lunch. However, poor Shawn ended up barbecuing in a monsoon, but at least we were able to send my Nana off while dry. She’s with her husband now, side by side in a plot that has other family members on my grandfather’s side. His parents and one brother, I believe.
Sunday – we went to lunch, a bookstore (yes, I know, I’m bad) and then to see Star Trek. Wow. Just, wow. I loved everything about it and loved the characters – all of them. Do you know how rare it is to like ALL characters in a movie? James T. Kirk was just that thin line of arrogant/obnoxious that kept me adoring him rather than wanting to slap him. The actor played him well. In fact, the entire casting was excellent.
Since Friday night I have been getting these waves of nausea which are driving me crazy. I also feel so exhausted that I might just collapse. I needed this long weekend, but I would like the nausea – that which was so bad upon our return home last night I didn’t eat supper and was up late because I couldn’t get comfortable enough to sleep – to just go away. I am feeling slightly better this morning. I am having a lovely cup of tea and puttering around on the laptop. VERY thankful that today is a day off for us Canadians because I think I slept about 3 hours.
Now I am going to hang some clothes on the line because it is FINALLY sunny. I might even read today since I am feeling less sleepy and more, um, well, more like reading than spending the day online.
Sadly, work tomorrow. But at least it’s a 4-day week, right?
May 11th, 2009 @ 11:08 am
… and she forgets about everything in the world – except, apparently, her mother.
 So my in-laws were over last night for a mother’s day BBQ dinner (hamburgers made by Shawn that turned out amazingly) and not only did my father-in-law bring me my new hand made piano bench (beautiful) and a box for my clothes pins for outside – he also brought me three huge and cooked lobsters. OH, YUM!
The big guy on the far right? Well, he’s missing his claws as you can see. One was gone and being cracked open almost instantly after being taken out of the bag. I thought of nothing else – just lobster. My in-laws were on the couch and I was gobbling down lobster meat. Although my FiL did help me open it, since I seem to have misplaced my nutcracker thing. The lobsters were huge, but they were actually in big, bigger, biggest size. And to be honest, as Shawn was talking to my parents all I thought about (aside from *CHOMP**YUM*GOBBLE*CHOMP!!* was, “Oh, I can have my mother over tomorrow for lunch because I’m home and – OH NO! She’s leaving for Ottawa tomorrow morning! Nooo!” So I phoned my parents’ place at 4:30 – they were just getting ready to have dinner with my sister and her family but I said to my mum – I have lobster for you!!!!!
So before my in-laws had left after dinner, my father was at the door picking up the lobster I put aside for my mum (the mid-sized one, thank you very much. I am THAT nice!) Actually when he phoned from his cell I asked him if he was right outside the front door. ha! I had this image of my mother standing on my front porch with a lobster bib and knife and fork in each hand. Hahahahah! I know I would have been there!
The biggest lobster? Finished before I went to bed. I had even eaten most of the smallest one, too. But I saved the tail for today because it was just a little too much lobster for me at once (I know! I was so disappointed in myself!) So that lobster tail was gone by 10AM today. *ahem*
By the way, I took today off as a vacation day. I have 5 days to take before the end of the month when our year rolls over.
And a huge thanks to my FiL who, when he went to get the lobsters on special for himself thought of me and how much I love them. So he bought six. He said he ate his three all at once and thought seriously about eating mine when he saw them in the fridge. Ha! I don’t blame him this was VERY good lobster. Oh, yum.
Of course after everyone left it was past 7:30 PM last night and Shawn and I even said “oh, we have to feed the dogs!” and then I got distracted with opening up the rest of my lobster and Shawn ran downstairs to start the laundry and only this morning on his way out the door to work did he say “We forgot to feed the dogs last night!”. Oops.
Damn, you give me lobster and it’s like there is nothing else in this world except me and that tasty, creepy-looking creature.
Oh, and though my photos do not do it justice, this is the piano bence my father-in-law made me:
It really is gorgeous when you see it up close and in person. The legs are each three different pieces of wood glued together. It’s fabulous.
Ok, off to spend the rest of my vacation day wishing I had more lobster to eat!
May 10th, 2009 @ 12:03 am
I have always been a Mommy’s Girl (sorry, Dad!  ). My mum has always been there for me, through everything – the thick, the thin, the good, the bad and the ugly. When I was bullied in school she was my only friend, the one I would turn to with my questions of “why?” and “what did I do wrong?”. Those are tough questions coming from a 9-year old. My mum was my comfort and safety from the world and was always there when I was sick.
We were perhaps too close, because we tend to get sympathy symptoms for each other when the other is going through something tough. It’s a little better now that we’re living apart and older, but I still get those hot flashes, Muther!
My mum taught me to be kind and compassionate and to always think of others first. Of course now, we’re both learning that once in a while a person does need to think of themselves or they will begin to lose themselves. My mum is slowly learning that now and I like to think I’m helping guide her on that journey – because after all these years of doing for others, I think she of all people, deserves to do for herself now. She’s raised two wonderful daughters (me being the best of the two, of course. Heh.), she has taken care of her parents for such a long time in the best way anyone could. Though my mother retired last May, her freedom from work and having to live every day for others was cut a little short when my grandfather passed away. Dealing with all that aftermath of a death in the family and then having to take extra care of my grandmother, who at 90 was suddenly on her own for the first time ever, my mother found herself in yet another full-time job. Not one of mother, or employee, but one of Full-Time Daughter and caretaker of her own mother.
She gives her all because that is who she is. She gives too much sometimes and I worry she’ll fall apart and so I try to get that net ready to catch her because she needs to have a safe place to fall back on if she needs it. Losing both parents in less than a year is not an easy thing, but I feel hopeful that now my mother will start to learn to think about herself for a while. Look after herself for the better. My sister and I are doing great on our own, she doesn’t have to be a full-time mother, daughter or employee now. Full-time wife, ok, but my Dad’s pretty great at being on his own as well. She can just send him wandering off with his camera with a quick exclamation of “Oo! Look! There’s a flower over there!” *point* and then when my father rushes off to capture that floral object digitally my mother can scurry off in the other direction and go on a bike ride, or read a book, or even better yet – take a NAP!
At any rate, it’ll be Her Time. Mummy Time.
I love my mum incredibly and am the person I am today because of so many of the things she taught me when I was a child and she was home to raise us. She only went back to work in my final year of high school. Not many people have the luxury to have a stay-at-home mum much these days and I think my sister and I were very lucky to have had that opportunity. I always knew she would be there when I needed her – and all the times she’s had to pick me up sick from school, or drive me to the hospital in the middle of the night. My mother has always been there for me and my sister and for others.
So today, this mother’s day, I hope you’re having the kind of day that you want to have, Mummy. You deserve it. Thank you for everything, I love you. (more than CAKE even! And roast beef! As long as they are made by you, of course… so more than THAT! That’s a whole lotta love you know!)
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i'm darkness and light and bubbles and faerie wings. i love purple and faeries and music and i'm pretty sure that WordPress hates me.
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