New Year's Eve....AGAIN!!!

Wasn't it just New Year's Eve a couple of months ago? 2024 has flown by so quickly in some ways that it only seems a few weeks ago that we were rejoicing that New Year's Eve 2023 was so bitterly cold outside and so snowy that there were no drunken revellers standing outside our bedroom window waiting for the free service transit buses to come to scoop them up and pour them out back at their homes.  Tonight it isn't exactly balmy, but it is not so cold and windy as to disturb the partiers from wandering about on the streets hollering and crying and fighting and whatever all else we have had the "joy" of waking up to during the early morning hours of New Year's Day.  It will be interesting to see what the next 10 hours or so hold around here.

As usual we aren't doing anything to celebrate the change of year and we are quite fine with that. Brrr and dark and drunk drivers....don't need it.  However we are binge watching the first season of the British crime drama "Luther", released back in 2010 and starring Idris Elba....a wonderful actor in a somewhat hokey crime drama production, but fun to watch none the less. Perhaps it improves over the following two seasons?  Whatever, we will watch and enjoy!  

We were supposed to be out having dinner with friends tonight but we got a call this morning that illness had stricken the household, so we will get together another time.  No worries. Knowing we didn't have to go out later in the afternoon gave us time to doddle about a grocery and pharmacy in the early afternoon to get some errands done with having to worry about what time we got home.  Besides last night we spent 3 wonderful hours in a restaurant with other friends, so how often do we need to be out in the cold winter evenings anyway? Right?

We spent the morning on the phone with our communications provider so we could change all our tv channels.  We slashed and burned and chopped and ended up with just over half the stations we have been needlessly paying for over the past few years.  Now we are saving ourselves between  thirty-five and forty dollars a month on those payments, even with the rise in prices.  YAY!!  Finally we are saving a few dollars each month on something!!!  No more movie channels that we don't watch more than three movies a year on, no more sports stations, no more specialty channels that rarely if ever play anything special, and mostly show reruns of various programmes that originally aired between 2011 and 2019! It feels good!

The highlight of the day was a phone call from our NYC "kids".  They have been checking up on us throughout the holiday season, making sure we are out socializing and having some fun this year. hahaha  The parent/child roles are beginning to reverse.....cute.....  They have been to and cooked for more latke parties during Hanukkah this year than ever before I think.  My soon to be daugher in law is determined she is going to teach our son to enjoy latkes, but he isn't yet convinced.  I think he enjoyed the Chinese food he made just before Christmas as much as the latkes he has been stuffed with lately.  

Another friend called today that I used to spend nearly every day with when we lived in the same city, but now we rarely get to see each other, so the phone calls, few and far between as they are, are precious. I think we laugh more than we talk. 

I am looking forward to another day of binge watching crime dramas tomorrow, a long and luxurious shower to begin my day after what is, hopefully, a decently long sleep tonight.  We completed reading Dickens' Christmas Carol today, a lovely family Christmas reading tradition of my husband's that I so enjoy.  Every year I notice descriptions and character notes that I haven't noticed before.

So, my prayer for all of you is for a happy, happy, healthy and prosperous 2025!

 

Moisturize, Moisturize, Moisturize!!!!

My husband has a seriously weird type of eczema on his lower legs that he has been treating with strongly medicated cream once a day for nearly two years now. Thankfully it began to show the most significant improvement in the past three or four months when he finally heeded his GP’s admonition that between doses he should, three or four times a day, moisturize, moisturize, moisturize!!! with a decent, non-greasy OTC cream. I am impressed by the improvement! 

A few weeks ago I began to wonder if that idea of moisturizing so often every day might help me as well with my own myriad winter skin issues that began to develop when we first moved from foothills to prairies over twenty years ago. So, I started the same moisturizing routine as my husband. Lo and behold, after only five weeks of this treatment, all those issues are either completely healed or nearly so. I am amazed. I am guessing more than one doctor  in all those years advised me to moisturize several times a day, but for whatever reason I forgot or didn’t want to be bothered, or, or, or…….

Now however, I am a big fan of the process. How grateful I am that simply moisturizing our sensitive skin is working well for us both. Thank you, my husband’s GP!!

Something To Look Forward To Tonight!

We received a surprise invitation this morning from church friends. They want to take us out for dinner this evening.  How delightful!  They are going to pick us up and bring us home as well, so that is most thoughtful of them.  This couple were long time friends of my parents, going back to before the husband began his secondary university education. Our parents were terrific friends in their latter years when they happened to move into condos only a block away from each other and had known each other through their church involvement for several decades before that.  We are very much looking forward to this evening, on this grey skied, rather depressing looking day.  Thank you Lord for this encouragement.

This afternoon we have to review all the new tv channel packages and available single stations so that we can update them tomorrow when a number of significant changes are occurring with our provider.  We have decided to eliminate the movie channel package, although we will lose our HBO channel and CRAVE service, but we watch today's movies so rarely, have seen the "older ones" from our youth sufficiently often to not need to see any of them again and as far as the truly oldie movies, we aren't interested in them and haven't been since sometime in the 1960's or so when our parents were viewing 1940's and 1950's black and whites and "now in techincolor"s when the two tv channels available to us then were replaying a few of them once and awhile.  We don't use the CRAVE feature as much as we thought we would either. That will be a twenty-five dollar a month drop in our subscription charges. Many of the programmes we have been watching on that particular package deal are available through the local library websites anyway.  We are also toying with the possibility of eliminating our sports network stations as well.  Boxing that interests me has pretty much moved over to Pay Per View and other American iterations of the sports stations that we can't get here. My husband will make that choice based on whether or not he wants to continue his annual autumn Canadian football watching.  We are once again going through a process of relinquishment as we get older. In this case we are just tired of watching useless programmes on tv and with the move away from cable to streaming, fewer and fewer of the programmes we currently enjoy will be available to us for the lower cost of cable, so we might as well get used to finding other forms of Entertainment for the Elderly.

Grocery shopping is going to have to happen once the tv situation is taken care of.  We don't need very many items, but once we eat the remaining turkey leftovers today for lunch we will be completely out of meat.  Each of our kind of milks and breads need to be replaced and bananas are always needed around here.  So happy for the gigantic load of groceries we brought home a couple of days before Christmas as we have needed to purchase almost nothing since then.

Speaking of food....aren't I always...teehee....it is time for me to eat lunch so I can be ready for dinner when our friends come to get us later on.

NOT Christmas Dinner Leftovers, Huzzah!!!

 After church this morning we decided we needed to go out for lunch and give the last couple of meals of Christmas dinner leftovers a hard pass until tomorrow!  As much as we love them, today we felt the need of a break.  We ended up at Knotted Thistle.  My husband enjoyed their delicious Guiness burger as there are a couple of decently thick slices of tomato and a goodly amount of lettuce on it, as well as the garlic aioli and the sour cabbage pickles and cheddar cheese.  I went all out and had the farthest from Christmas dinner as I could imagine: the Celtic plate which is a large amount of garlic mashed potatoes covered in brisket, peas, fried cabbage and bacon with dark stout gravy and yummy dried onion strips on top.  I brought half of it home for dinner tonight.  There were only 2 other diners there during our lunchtime, so it was private. We sat near the fireplace so it was also very cozy indeed.  Excellent service as always, so yes, it was a great break from Christmas and from the inside of this suite.  

Now it is time for me to iron the clothes from yesterday's laundry.  There is very little to iron this time, six (?) items?  No big deal and large dining room tablecloth only needs touching up, not a full ironing.  

Sure am enjoying the sun today.  It is getting cold once again, but the sun is cheery to look at and saves us from becoming depressed as we enter the worst of the winter cold and mental/emotional doldrums.

Boxing Day Blues Are Not So Bad This Year! YAY!

 Usually on Boxing Day I have a bad case of the blues after being stuck at home for Christmas Eve...usually weather related...and Christmas Day...especially since we have lost all our extended family members and our son isn't able to come home for the holidays very often.  

However, this year, despite the fabulously warm, melty weather calling me out of doors, I am quite content to remain inside.  Christmas Eve and Day were spent prepping food and visiting with our guests over dinner, then today I got to sleep in for a change, enjoyed an hour or more washing up the dishes from yesterday and tidying up the place.  I am just waiting for a batch of sesame crescent cookie dough to finish its one hour wait until it is time to form the crescents and pop them into the oven.  The batter looks, at the half way point of the wait, as if it doesn't have enough flour in it, so....we shall see how it turns out.  I have low expectations considering my life long record of being a rather poor baker.  However, I won't know for another thirty minutes, so I have that much time left to continue to delude myself that all will be well, hahahaha.

Tomorrow we have company coming over for lunch.  I have the menu planned and some food prep underway.  By the weekend life will be getting back to normal.  We have to be up and at 'em next Monday and hie ourselves over the SaskTel as soon as they open so we can make some changes to our television programming.  We are losing my favourite BBCF station as our free promotion ends Sunday evening and I don't want to miss some of the British crime drama and game shows I have gotten used to seeing over the past few months.  We are dropping quite a few stations that served their purpose in the past, but changes in programming mean we rarely watch them any more. Then it will be time for the annual "It's New Year, Meh, Whatever..." non-celebration before life returns to normal scheduling at last.

It is finally clouding over after a lovely, sunny morning and early afternoon.  I don't mind the clouds as the weather is still incredibly warm for this time of year....about -5C. Wow!!  Unfortunately that does make for treacherous walking outside as the melt and refreeze cycle is in full swing on the sidewalks, but I am going to go outside now and stand on the deck to breathe in the crisp, fresh air!  Then I will tackle those cookies and see what happens!

Merry(?) Christmas!

I don’t know how many of you are having a happy Christmas/holiday season and how many of you are simply gritting your teeth and waiting for all the seasonal folderol to be over with, but regardless I wish you a relaxing and peaceful December 25th!  

We are likely going to be very tired today from a short sleep. 😴 

Last night we enjoyed our own church’s Christmas Eve service via Zoom at 6pm. At 8pm my husband suited up to walk the over three kilometres to his colleague’s Anglican 9pm mass. There is nowhere to park anywhere near that old neighborhood church and the streets are often so treacherous for driving that my husband usually walks over there on Christmas Eve, but I was leery of him being out there alone, in the dark, on an abnormally warm December evening in the Transition Area of our city, right by the night time eerie Wascana Park. I made him promise he would contact me upon his arrival and as he was leaving to come home after the service. About twenty minutes after he left the phone rang, and it was him. He decided at the half way mark to turn around and come home. At that point he realized he was only a quarter way through the round trip, that his legs were tired, that the wind would be in his face coming home, that he is helping cook for and host today’s dinner  guests and that it could be after 11pm before he got home. As much as I wanted him to be able to worship at an Anglican Church for Christmas, I admit I am proud of him for being so sensible.

However, our plans for a subsequently earlier bedtime to prepare for today’s food extravaganza were scuttled when our son awakened his dad from a sound sleep shortly before midnight to ask if he and his partner could share a Zoom call Christmas conversation with us at 8:30 am today! We both had a terrible time getting back to sleep and soon I will have to awaken my husband to chat with our “kids”. Hohoho! Meeeeerrry Christmas! I just pray my sweetheart can get through today sans his usual lack of sleep induced headache or he will be excusing himself to go for a nap shortly after our guests arrive this afternoon! At least we are having that precious family Zoom call.

If our day is less than perfect because we are overly tired, rather than complaining I will think of a dear friend here who spent her birthday having painful pre-op testing for a lifesaving surgery on Christmas Eve Day. Today, instead of celebrating with her extended family she is at home recovering, and it won’t be easy. As I  think of her right now my own exhaustion is fading and I owe it to her not to whine about being a little lacking in sleep. 

Well, time to get the computer running for our incoming call with our family.

Do look for any possible joys that could come your way today as we look forward to a happy(ier) New Year!

Maple, I Get It! Been There......

MAPLE...by Robert Frost

 

Her teacher's certainty it must be Mabel

Made Maple first take notice of her name.

She asked her father and he told her, "Maple--

Maple is right."      

 

           "But teacher told the school

There's no such name."

 

          "Teachers don't know as much

As fathers about their children, you tell teacher.

You tell her that it's M-A-P-L-E.

You ask her if she knows a maple tree.

Well, you were named after a maple tree.

Your mother named you.  You and she just saw

Each other in passing in the room upstairs,

One coming this way into  life, and one

Going the other out of life--you know?

So you can't have much recollection of her.

She had been having a long look at you.

She put her finger in your cheek so hard

It must have made a dimple there, and said,

'Maple.'  I said it too: 'Yes, for her name.'

She nodded. So we're sure there's no mistake.

I don't know what she wanted it to mean,

But it seems like some word she left to bid you

Be a good girl--be like a maple tree.

How  like a maple tree's for us to guess.

Or for a little girl to guess sometime.

Not now--at least I shouldn't try too hard now.

By and by I will tell you all I know

About the different trees, and something, too,

About your mother that perhaps may help."

Dangerous self-arousing words to sow.

Luckily all she wanted of her name then

Was to rebuke her teacher with it next day,

And give the teacher a scare as from her father.

Anything further had been wasted on her,

Or so he tried to think to avoid blame.

She would forget it.  She all but forgot it.

What he sowed with her slept so long a sleep,

And came so near death in the dark of years, 

That when it woke and came to life again

The flower was different from the parent seed.

It came back vaguely at the glass one day,

As she stood saying her name over aloud,

Striking it gently across her lowered eyes

To make it go well with the way she looked. 

What was it about her name?  Its strangeness lay

In having too much meaning.  Other names,

As Lesley, Carol, Irma, Marjorie,

Signified nothing.  Rose could have a meaning,

But hadn't as it went. (She knew a Rose.)

This difference from other names it was

Made people notice it--and notice her.

(They either noticed it, or got it wrong.)

Her problem was to find out what it asked

In dress or manner of the girl who bore it.

If she could form some notion of her mother--

What she had thought was lovely, and what was good.

This was her mother's childhood home;

The house one story high in front, three stories

On the end it presented to the road.

(The arrangement made a pleasant sunny cellar.)

Her mother's bedroom was her father's still,

Where she could watch her mother's picture fading.

Once she found a  bookmark in the Bible

A maple leaf she thought must have been laid

in wait for her there. She read every word

Of the two pages it was pressed between,

As if it was her mother speaking to her.

But forgot to put the leaf back in closing

And lost the place never to read again.

She was sure, though, there had been nothing in it. 

So she looked for herself, as everyone

Looks for himself, more or less outwardly.

And her self-seeking, fitful though it was,

May still have been what led her on to read,

And think a little, and get some city schooling.

She learned shorthand, whatever shorthand may

Have had to do with it--she sometimes wondered.

So, till she found herself in a strange place

For the name Maple to  have brought her to,

Taking dictation on a paper pad

And, in the pauses where she raised her eyes,

Watching out of a nineteenth story window

An airship labouring with unshiplike motion

And a vague all-disturbing roar above the river

Beyond the highest city built with hands.

Someone was saying in such natural tones

She almost wrote the words down on her knee,

"Do you know you remind me of a tree--

A maple tree?"

         

 "Because my name is Maple?"

 

"Isn't it Mabel? I thought it was Mabel." 

"No doubt you've heard the office call me Mabel.

I have to let them call me what they like."

 

They were both stirred that he should have divined

Without the name her personal mystery.

It made it seem as if there just be something

She must have missed herself.   So they were married,

And took the fancy home with them to live by.

 

They went on a pilgrimage once to her father's

(The house one story high in front, three stories 

On the side it presented to the road)

To see if there was not some special tree

She might have overlooked.  They could find none,

Not so much as a single tree for shade,

Let alone grove of trees for sugar orchard.

She told him of the bookmark maple leaf

In the big Bible, and all she remembered

Of the place marked with it--"Wave offering,

Something about wave offering, it said."

 

"You've never asked your father outright, have you?"

 

" I have, and been put off sometime, I think."

(This was her faded memory of the way

Once long ago her father had put himself off.)

 

"Because no telling but it may have been

Something between your father and your mother

Not meant for us at all."

 

              "Not meant for me?

Where would the fairness be in giving me 

A name to carry for life and never know

The secret of?"

 

     "And then it may have been 

Something a father couldn't tell a daughter

As well as could a mother.  And again

It may have been their one lapse into fancy

'Twould be too bad to make him sorry for

By bringing it up when he was too old.

Your father feels us round him with our questing,

And holds us off unnecessarily,

As if he didn't know what little thing

Might lead us on to a discovery.

It was as personal as he could be

About the way he saw it was with you,

To say your mother, had she lived, would be

As far again as from being born to bearing."

 

"Just one look more with what you say in mind,

And I give up"; which last look came to nothing.

But though they now gave up the search forever,

They clung to what one had seen in the other

By inspiration. It proved there was something.

They kept their thoughts away from when the maples

Stood uniform in buckets, and the steam

Of sap and snow rolled off the sugarhouse.

When they made her related to the maples,

It was the tree the autumn fire ran through

And swept of leathern leaves, but left the bark

Unscorched, unblackened, even, by any smoke.

They always took their holidays in autumn.

Once they came upon a maple in a glade,

Standing alone with smooth arms lifted up,

And every leaf of foliage she'd worn

Laid scarlet and pale pink about her feet.

But its age kept them from considering this one.

Twenty-five years ago at Maple's naming

It hardly could have been a two-leaved seedling

The next cow might have licked up out at pasture.

Could it have been another maple like it?

They  hovered for a moment near discovery,

Figurative enough to see the symbol,

But lacking faith in anything to mean

The same at different times to different people.

Perhaps a filial diffidence partly kept them

From thinking it could be a thing so bridal.

And anyway it came too late for Maple.

She used her hands to cover up her eyes.

 

"We would not see the secret if we could now:

We are not looking for it any more."

 

Thus had a name with meaning, given in death,

Made a girl's marriage, and ruled her life.

No matter that the meaning was not clear.

A name with meaning could bring up a child,

Taking the child out of the parents' hands.

Better a meaningless name, I should say,

As leaving more to nature and happy chance.

Name children some names and see what you do.

 

 

Greasy Streets...The Price We Pay For Catching The Edge of A Warm Alberta Clipper!!!

As wonderful as it was to be out and about this warm, melty morning completing the last of our pre-Christmas store closure errands, I am so very grateful my husband was happy to do the driving.

The big warm up of over 20 degrees Celsius since yesterday morning has left the streets a slippery, more dangerous than usual, train wreck of black ice and pavement frost.  Aiii yiii yiiii.....that old pop song "Slip Slidin' Away" sung by Paul Simon a few decades ago is more than appropriate for today.  Trying to stop for red lights was even more dangerous than actually driving because the build up of ice at the intersections was worse than the narrow lanes of traffic that had a couple of tire tracks looking like they were clear and dry, but in reality had a thin layer of either black ice or the equally terrifying pavement frost over the top of them.  Our car's automatic four wheel drive component kicked in more than a couple of times as we slid to a shuddering halt, more or less, before skittering uncontrollably through the intersections when the lights turned green.  A couple of times my husband knew it was impossible to stop safely on a yellow light, so he slid us through just as the light was turning red. I am praying we don't get a ticket for that as we will have to go to court and fight it. The conditions made those two stops completely impossible even though my husband was only driving at the speed of 30 km per hour.  At one intersection he had to begin pulling around the corner on a right turn even though there was oncoming left turn traffic coming through in front of us, which probably scared them no end, but he noticed the crew cab truck behind us wasn't going to be able to stop in time to avoid rear ending us and he had to get out of the way. Fortunately the sidewalk beside our turn lane welcomed our vehicle for a few seconds, so we didn't hit anyone.  At another right hand turn corner the 1/4 ton truck in front of us slid badly on the thick black ice carpeting the road and nearly hit a car in the lane beside him, but my husband, who has had a ton of experience driving on terrible winter streets, was able to navigate that corner from a stopped position with minimal fishtailing that posed no danger to other drivers.  It was tempting to just close my eyes until we got home again, but I managed not to completely freak out. I am just so grateful it was not me who had to navigate the treacherous driving conditions.  Brrrrrr....I don't remember the last time I was this grateful to have arrived home safely. Of course our errands took us all over the city so we got a pretty good look at how bad ALL the streets are here.

Just after we got home and had our lunch, the maintenance bobcat and the huge plough arrived to start taking the thick build up of ice and snow off the top of our parking lot.  We weren't notified of a full parking lot cleaning, but we were able to join with some other neighbours in getting our cars moved out onto the street so the plough could scrape the snow and ice off right down to the pavement where we all park our cars.  So glad my husband noticed what was happening so he could move the car.  Now the lot is almost bare and I can get off the raised lawn down onto the parking lot beside the car without having to inch my way over the icy humps of packed snow that were there previously. Hallelujah!  A cleaner parking lot: Merry Christmas to us from the maintenance department!  

We are both grateful that, barring some disaster, we won't have to drive anywhere for the rest of the week!  My husband may opt to attend a late night service at his Anglican colleague's church on Christmas Eve, but I think I will take in our own church service on Zoom. Trying to park anywhere near our downtown church on Christmas Eve is a nightmare I don't care to experience ever again.  There are two churches almost beside each other and when we have special services with lots of visitors both at the same time we have to be there an hour or more prior to the start of the service if we want any hope of a reasonable place to park.  With it being Christmas Eve all the tenants and home owners in that same block will be home early from work and will have their own cars in those otherwise available spots.  Nope, don't want to actually attend in person!  

Tomorrow we begin cooking for Christmas Day dinner.  Praying for good highways and good health for all four of us so the food extravaganza can go ahead as planned. 

A Truly Beautiful Winter Day Today!

Today is truly lovely. The weather has warmed up to just below zero and we will be sitting just at or slightly above the freezing mark for the next few days.  The sun has been shining since before lunch time and the wind is a mere breeze.  I am most grateful for this good break before the next weeks of January Cold and Snowfall arrive sometime in the new year.  The encouraging thing to me is that once we reach January 1st, we will only have another approximately 10 weeks of real winter left.  By mid March, although it will still be somewhat chilly and snowy, we will be close enough to spring coming that my hope will be restored that I can manage to continue living here on the prairies.

I had a terrible time sleeping last night, so just for fun I got looking online at rental units back in my old hometown of Calgary.  I got quite a pleasant shock:  in my old and still beloved neighbourhood we could rent a three bedroom, two bathroom condo in a very nice building with very low condo fees for the same price we could rent an apartment or townhouse right here...BUT the Calgary condo's monthly rent include all 3 basic utilities, which rentals here usually do not, plus there is both an underground parking stall and an outdoor stall for a guest, neither of which are guaranteed at most of the comparable units here.  To be quite frank if we were not sitting here for the next year or more awaiting my hip replacement surgeries we would soon be on our way to Calgary to seek a place to live closer to the mountains for my husband and closer to the chinook belt for me!  (and closer to our remaining Alberta friends as well)  That was our winter doldrums  flight of fancy at 4am today, hahaha. Yup, my husband wasn't sleeping well either.  The surgery is definitely being used by God to help us to stay put. hahaha  Fun to day dream though when the dreams of sleep elude us.

My husband preached at church this morning and did a grand job.  He used Mary's Magnificat and her relationship with Elizabeth as he discussed God's use of women to bring about many of his important historical moves.  He tends to come at various Scriptures with a little different twist sometimes so he certainly has the gift of keeping peoples' attention.  hahaha  He is very good at getting people to think about what they have "always" known and see if they can expand their thoughts just a bit.  He is a very popular guest preacher at our church, so I am happy for him.

Tomorrow we will head out for one last shopping trip just for a couple of fresh items for Christmas dinner that are not likely to be sold outs, do some banking and then come home for me to do some house work prior to Christmas guests arriving.  The next day we will begin cooking various items for Christmas dinner that can easily be made a day in advance, so that on Christmas Day we will be able to take some time to visit with our guests instead of being in the kitchen for hours, leaving our guests to fend for themselves.  It is one of the few occasions when a more open concept arrangement would be of benefit as it is the only day of the year we ever prepare this much food all at once. Boxing Day we will flop out for the day and live on leftovers, then the following day some friends are coming over for lunch. We want to prepare something completely NOT Christmas dinner leftover-ish to give them a dietary break from the usual Christmas week meals.  We are looking fowrard to Christmas week this year, much more than in previous years when we were either completely alone, just the two of us, or else invited to join with another family or families for their celebrations where, despite the good intentions of our hosts, we always felt just a bit like we were intruding on their kids and grandkids....not that anyone has ever made a point of making us feel that way, but, well, ya' know........hope YOUR Christmas plans are taking shape for a happy celebration....and if not, well the season will be over in a matter of days and life can go on as usual.  When we have had some yukky Christmases in years past, that is the reminder that keeps me from falling into a deep depression.  This too shall pass...

Winter Solstice....At Last The Days Will Slowly Get "Longer" From Here On....

I look forward to the Winter Solstice every year because it means we will have more light each day between now and the Summer Solstice. Reaching the "shortest" day of the year restores hope that more hours of daylight are on the way in the coming months.  Already looking forward to the spring time!  Right now it is nearly 5pm and the sun is setting, the darkness is looming once more and it will be pitch black before 6pm.  These are the days of the doldrums for me, but I live for the hope of the rising sun each morning.

Merry Christmas From Our "Kids"!

 We received two beautiful Christmas/Hanukkah gifts from our kids this week and we are blown away by their thoughtfulness.

Yesterday a boxed set of books arrived: The Hebrew Bible translated into English with an accompanying commentary by Robert Alter.  Yes, yes, we know the foibles of reading a translation and commentary written by someone who approaches the project from a more academic point of view than a religious one, but he certainly seems to bring out the narrative and literary features of the writing out better than some of those more focused on the spiritual details of translation as they relate to the future movement of Christianity.  So, yes, we have started reading it already.  It is nice always to get a fresh/different perspective that challenges us to think deeply once again.  It is so easy to turn the Scriptures into a memorized set of platitudes interpreted by a background of church and other religious assumptions, depending on our faith backgrounds.  Looking forward to this project of winter reading together.

This morning a lovely flower and greens arrangement arrived via a local florist...red and white roses, carnations, "berries",  balsam fir branches, cedar, pine, etc. in a small and pretty vase.  That last detail is quite a relief as I already packed up our flower vases back in the spring when we thought we were moving right away and I am not 100% certain now which box they are in!!

Here is a photo so you can enjoy them as well:

Christmas and Hanukkah Joy From Our Kids!

 

Our friends Kat and Val came over for lunch today and as always when we spend time together the laughter overflowed.  They are so much fun to visit with!!  It was a a party for Kat as she started a wonderful new job recently, combined with a bit of Christmas celebration.  We ordered take out from DarBar and thoroughly enjoyed it.  The lamb rogan josh and eggplant bengan barty were particularly tasty today.  We discovered recently that besides choosing the level of spice for each dish it is also possible to have reduced sodium, so the meals have been even healthier for us since we began asking for the lower sodium versions.

The weather is trending much warmer than usual for this time of year.  The warmer air blew in early this morning, so we woke up to fog and incredible frost "sculptures" on all the tree branches across the road.  It is to remain warm, even possibly going slightly above zero on Christmas Day....SO now we pray there is no freezing rain and everyone's Christmas will be merry indeed!  Our kids certainly have made ours a very  lovely one despite their absence this year.

Christmas Deliveries, Mini Blizzards and Passing On the Blessing of Provision To The Next Generation

Part way through this morning another snowfall arrived, with high winds and drifting.  The hour I spent outside yesterday shoveling a pathway across the lawn to our car has now been kinda wasted as this time we have a south wind blowing the snow back in to cover the path up once again. Typical winter here though, so no worries.  After the snowfall and wind stop I will shovel once again.

Our son called us this morning with good news: the parcel he and his partner sent to us is scheduled to be delivered by this afternoon, so we are keeping watch on both doors so we don't miss it.  It could easily be stolen or quickly covered in snow.  

After being raised in our household, which was so totally dependent upon "supernatural" provision while my husband and I both battled chronic illness driven employment issues for much of our son's childhood, our son is discovering for himself the ability of God to care for him.  In true artist fashion he will soon be at the end of his financial resources after his last run of art sales and has been praying for help going into the new year.  Yesterday he ran into an aquaintance from the MoMA who hired him a few years ago to light an exhibition there and she was thrilled to find out he would be equally as thrilled to do a temporary install once again starting in March.  He knew he would be okay financially until the end of January without much part time work, but february was looming.  Last night he received a call from his agent to say she sold two of his paintings that very afternoon and so that will float him for February.  It means he can take a few days off around Christmas/Hanukkah as well as continue painting full time in his studio until the March work begins.  He has also been stressed about being ready for his next exhibition that was originally going to happen in February, but is now pushed back by a few months. Whew!!  He can relax, do his best work and also have time for other part time positions once the Moma work is completed.  He is learning now for himself more than ever before  how God blesses his people in times of need.  often that doesn't mean riches or healing, but it does mean God's help, encouragement and comfort is there in the midst of the trials if we are willing to believe it and look for it and accept it when it comes. This is the kind of family spiritual legacy we inherited from my parents and now our son is reaping the benefits of that legacy of trust in god as well.  he has survived many disasters in his life and we are pleased he is currently able to enjoy a time of blessing before the next trials come into his life.

I was able to plough through the snow with my spiked cane over to the office to pay our January rent today.  Our rent went up one hundred dollars a month and because we have no lease it will likely go up another hundred dollars a month on June 1, but as I continue checking available rental accommodations once every week or two, I see that we are still paying between five and six hundred dollars a month less than comparable anywhere else in the city. So, as long as our neighbours on the other side of the wall remain with us when their present lease expires at the end of May, we will just tough it out until I have my hip surgeries and then see what new adventures God may have in store for us.

I am getting excited about Christmas this year for the first time since 2019 when our son was last home to celebrate with us.  Dear friends are coming over for lunch tomorrow and then the amp up to Christmas Day feasting will begin.  I have lots of time to stumble around cleaning house before the food prep has to get started.  Since my husband wants to do most of the cooked foods, I will have a blast preparing the cold dishes and snacks.  The weather is scheduled for a giant warm up starting on Christmas Eve Day and I am hoping God will grant us all mercy for Christmas Day travelling.....as in please may there be no freezing rain that will cancel our and many other peoples' plans for celebrations.  Amen and here's hoping......

Not What I Thought I Was Getting!

Weeeeellll, I got the new shower curtain put up and….weeeeelll….i got a bit of a surprise! 

The curtain came in a sturdy plastic case with a cutout on one side so that the pattern and colours would be visible. Handy, dandy, right? What was visible was a white curtain with two inch diameter circles in what I call modern beach house colours…blue, green and teal in muted tones, not quite pastels but certainly not garish jewel tones. I loved it as soon as I saw it. 

Weeelllll….as I was unfolding the curtain and placing it on the shower cubicle hooks I discovered quite a surprise: beside each row of circles and done on the same colours, are cartoonish bears standing on their hind legs. Wha???? I was shocked to find my shower curtain with a design far more appropriate for children than for folk our age. The visibility panel on the packaging is not wide enough for those consarn bears to show up!! My husband took one look at it and said quite kindly, “You didn’t realize, did you?”, before bursting into one of his rare laughing fits. Aiiii yiiii….

So, now we have an even more interesting bathroom than before. Guess I will just tell guests who use the bathroom that the shower curtain is to amuse our grandchildren. Oh…..wait….we don’t have any grandchildren….hmmmmm….well I will think of some kind of reasonable excuse for us having such a cutsie curtain on the shower bar!  

Sometimes Techology Is A Little Bit Of The All Right!

The past couple of days we have enjoyed receving Christmas greetings from friends all over the country and beyond via e-mail letters. Since the Canada Post workers' strike began prior to optimum card sending time and only ended by government decree a couple of days ago, what with the backlog of things that were already in the system prior to the strike, sending cards via snail mail isn't the best option this Christmas.  So, I am enjoying having the email option for communicating seasonal greetings.  Thanking God for this particular technology that is keeping us in touch with those we rarely see or hear from otherwise, mostly due to the geographical distances involved.

The other happy tech news I have to report is that the new tv remote is all set up and working well.  It took some unnecessary "doing" to get it set up to control both the tv and the PVR system and that was pretty hilarious.  My husband decided late in the afternoon yesterday to set it up.  He read through both pages of instructions and located a couple of different ways it might be done.  The easiest way he found didn't work at all....I'd say it didn't work "remotely", but that would be a terrible pun, wouldn't it? teehee.  So, he called me to come and help him.  He pushed the buttons on the remote while I read him the codes that our particular brand of tv uses to connect it to the remotes our communications company uses.  For our brand of tv there were about 15 different codes.  Not one of them worked. So, we tried them all again with no better success. My husband was very upset that his tech savvyness seemed to have deserted him and I was upset because I had three tv programme season finales showing last night that I dearly wanted to watch.  However, before we gave up in despair....it was now too late to call the company because they were closed for the day....I noticed a small section of the instructions my husband had missed.  It had to do with the number of times the set up button blinked before it was ready to receive the appropriate tv code.  I asked my husband if it had been blinking twice before he punched in the codes. "Oh yes.", he said. "In fact it is blinking five times every time."  I started laughing and told him that before he entered the code it was only supposed to blink twice....he had assumed the instructions meant it had to blink at LEAST twice.  I asked him if it had been blinking five times consistently as he tried the different codes and he said it had been. So, I laughed again and explained to him that if it blinks five times instead of twice it means the batteries are too low.  The company had included two brand new batteries with the remote and I was not thrilled that they were already dying, but my husband looked a tad sheepish and admitted that he hadn't actually put the new ones in. He had salvaged the old ones from the remote we had just returned, hoping to get a bit more use from them.  I took them out of the remote, put the brand new batteries in, located an even easier connect method he had also missed in the instructions that didn't require using multiple code attempts and in less than thirty seconds all was working well and has continued to work ever since. hahahahaha  We wasted 30 minutes on a 30 second installation. hahahaha  Typical of us at this point in our lives, hahaha.  My poor husband felt SO stupid. He is the King of instruction readers, Mr. Fixit for most all of our communications tech issues, but yesterday he just wasn't up to snuff...I think it was because in the back of his mind he was still focused on writing Sunday's sermon, hahaha.  Anyway, all is well now.

I got thinking about our grocery shopping trip yesterday; how we noticed the Salvation Army collection pot at the exit door to the one store only because it was being manned by a harmonica playing volunteer!  Again...is it one of those "only in Regina" scenarios?  The fellow was playing "I'll Fly Away" on the harmonica and he was doing an excellent job.  I told him I would enjoy paying him busking money as well as giving the Sally Ann my donation and he had a good laugh over that.  It seemed so incongruous to me: a grocery store with a little red and white Salvation Army money collection pot hanging by a chain from a blue tripod and being looked after by an elderly man playing gospel songs, not even Christmas carols, on a harmonica against a backdrop of wilting lettuce, stale buns and frantic shoppers wrestling with squeaky shopping carts, the automatic exit doors opening and closing every few seconds, blasting the volunteer and his jingle pot with gusts of freezing air....is it just me or does this seem a bit unusual?  Would it have seemed less odd to me if he had been playing "The First  Noel" or "Away In A Manger"?? Some of the things I see in this city leave me incredulous to the point of sometimes wondering if I am actually hallucinating!  My husband confirmed my jingle pot sighting though...and the harmonica music... oh wow....

 

Joy In The Midst Of Today's Storm...It's All About The Timing!!

It has been an amazing day!  At the moment there is a heavy snowfall and increasing winds, but we accomplished our necessary out of the house chores this morning and even lunch out before the storm hit the city.  I praise God for the timing of our own schedule today and also I am praying for people who were either unaware of the impending storm or have no choice but to be out and about this afternoon, possibly even out on the highways and who could be endangering themselves as a result.  

My husband and I knew this blizzard was coming sometime in the early afternoon so we planned to get our shopping all done ahead of that by leaving home at 9am, but my husband needed an extra hour of sleep more than he needed to be racing about the city, so we finally got away 9:45am. I thought that was pretty decent as the poor man was truly not ready to get up and moving when he finally woke up just after 9am.  As it happened we arrived at our nearest SaskTel outlet just as they were unlocking the doors. They would have not been open yet had we kept our original schedule. My husband was the first customer there today.  We were there to turn in our old TV remote that has slowly quit working over the past several weeks. By last night it wasn't turning the tv on or off, the volume was no longer working and it was a struggle to change the channels. Fortunately we still had the old remote that came with our rather elderly tv and could control the On/Off switch and the volume with that.  We now have the new control and batteries to operate it and once I am done posting I will get brave enough to put the batteries into it and hope and PRAY that it works. Three of the tv series I watch are having their season finales tonight and I will be rather unhappy if I can't see them.  hahaha

A trip to London Drugs was next to pick up some specialty Christmas foods for our Christmas dinner guests and a handful of new novels for me.  It is time for a break from textbooks on philosophy and theology.  I need to read some useless fluff and relax my mind for a couple of weeks.  From there we headed out to three different grocery stores to finish collecting the Christmas week groceries.  The only things I think we will need at the last minute are a couple of fresh produce items we will likely still be able to pick up at our neighbourhood grocery early on Christmas Eve Day. I assume they will be closing by 4pm as usual to give their staff a few extra hours of holiday time with their families.

My husband decided we should drive to the gasoline station on the in-city Reservation lands and take advantage of the nine cent a litre discount as our car's gasoline tank was dangerously close to reading Empty.  Turns out we actually saved seventeen cents a litre over the new, higher prices posted by most of our area gasoline stations this morning. The substantial saving was worth the out of the way drive.

The station is only a few blocks away from the Afghan Cuisine Restaurant.  We have not been there since just before COVID in 2020. It used to be a buffet, but COVID cancelled that kind of service of course.  The original owner is no longer working there and his son and wife have inherited the day to day running of the business, the wait service and cooking.  I don't know if there are ever any other staff there, but today there was only the serving son and his cooking wife.  There was an office Christmas party luncheon happening in part of the restaurant and with only one cook, it took an incredibly long time for our order to be taken and our food to arrive.  We were rather disappointed, UNTIL the food began to arrive!!  Oh my....it was DELICIOUS and worth every second of the extra time we waited. The staff apologies for the wait were absolutely unnecessary!  We will definitely return there some time when we have more time to just relax and enjoy it, a time when we don't have produce waiting in the car on a -38C day!  We ordered the Platter for 2 and next time will try ordering some of the more exotic dishes not on the platter, but wow, the platter food was fabulous.  We started off with a huge plate of salad with chopped romaine, tomatoes and thin slices of cucumber. No dressing and it wasn't necessary anyway. I LOVE tasting the actual vegetables instead of using them as a base for sweet and sour dressings.  We could only finish half of it and since we carry our own takeout boxes in the car, it was easy to put the rest of it away. Next came two giant stuffed pastries, similar to the smaller pakoras served in the Indian restaurants....this is the Afghan take on them....oh my...they are so large that we split one in half to eat there and brought the other one home.  They came with a small bowl of dill dressing that was very good indeed.  Next came a HUGE platter with two different kinds of rice: a saffron rice and a browned rice topped with slivers of cooked carrot and raisins.  A minute later our meat kabobs arrived, with the meat already removed from the skewers....absolutely appreciate that! There was a long strip of sausage meat of some kind, four huge cubes of chicken marinated in lemon and something else I couldn't figure out, plus four huge cubes of beef.  We thought that was it, but lastly we received a dish of yellow lentils with mixed vegetable bits for pouring over our rice.  By the time all the food arrived we realized that every single take out carton in our tote bag would be filled with food for supper tonight.  I still have two hours to wait before I can eat again, but I can barely wait! hahahahah  It is all so very yummy!  I can certainly recommend it to a few of our more adventurous friends. Afghani food is not spicy as a rule, so it is perfect for people who want to try Asian food but without the hot peppers and other heavy spicing.  The cost of our platter for 2 was only $49 plus tax and tip....good grief, two burgers and fries at the pub costs nearly sixty-five dollars these days and the food is greasier and saltier and generally less healthy than what we had today for far less money.  There are platters for 2, 4, 6 and 8 people, all reasonably priced, plus the regular ala carte menu.  So, at this point we will be eating Indian food at DarBar and Afghani food at Afghan Cuisine.  Yum, yum and double yum!!

We began our drive home just as the first small snowflakes began to fall.  Talk about a whole day of perfect timing for what we needed to accomplish.  We are delighted and now my husband can spend the rest of the day working on his Sunday sermon.  I am going to hang up  the new shower curtain set I purchased as one of my own Christmas treats. I also have a 210 gram bag of Cheesies for my Christmas snacking treat. Between the high carb count and the amount of sodium, I can only eat a very few at one time, so have the bag stashed in the bottom drawer of my desk. That is where I keep seasonal treats that are not allowed to be part of my daily diet. That is the place where I most often forget they are there and thus limit my intake and stretch the treat over a fairly long period of time. I will have Cheesies to snack on until likely the end of January or into February.

I am concerned that tomorrow the weekly coffee get together with my friend from church is going to end up being cancelled once again due to weather. Last week I had to cancel because it was -41C outside, three weeks during the previous month I had to cancel because I had COVID, we got one coffee time in a couple of weeks ago and now it looks like I may be cancelling it again. How very disappointing. Thankfully she is on the same wavelength I am on in regard to not fighting winter weather just for a 90 minute coffee time since it entails a lot of driving back and forth for me.  God bless her understanding nature.

As I have been writing this post the snowfall has become thicker and thicker.  The drifts in our parking lot and across the lawns are forming already, only 3 hours into this system.  We are under a heavy snowfall warning as the system moves from north central Alberta in an angle across the central and south eastern portions of Saskatchewan and into Manitoba.  May people on the highways get safely to their destinations before the roads become impassible due to deep snow, the already existing ice and wind blown snow creating a complete lack of visibility.  Keep us all safe Lord, thank you and Amen!

" The North Wind Doth Blow and We Shall Have Snow........".

 Apparently we shall have a LOT of snow....heavy snow...blowing snow....beginning at approximately noon tomorrow.  Grrrrrr....just when we thought we had picked a super good day to complete our Christmas meal grocery shopping. So, my poor sleepy husband is going to have to be dragged off to the store far earlier than he is going to feel ready to go.  Oh well...that is life in the winter, right?  With an overnight windchill of -39C coming up in about 15 hours, our car is going to be plugged in tonight right before we go to bed.  If we end up having to go shopping at 8am or before I am not going to risk the car not starting. It only costs a few extra dollars for the outside power anyway and we haven't had to plug the car in very often yet this winter.  I hope all the blowing snow and storms will be in abeyance for Christmas Eve through Boxing Day travellers.

What a lovely morning I had!  My walking partner came over for a grand chat, bearing a tiny, lovely Christmas Cactus plant with a few bloom buds on it. I am hoping that moving it over here will not cause those buds to fall off before they bloom, but whatever....if it doesn't bloom for me this year, it likely will next year.  The other little Christmas cactus my neighbour gave me earlier this year has had two gorgeous white with pink tipped blooms and there are more to come apparently.  Of all the house plants anyone could give me, Christmas Cactus plants are my very favourite.

My son and I had a texting conversation this morning as well and he called to chat with his dad after that.  Love hearing from him. He is rejoicing that at present he is working full time on his paintings for upcoming shows. His temporary job hours petered out again, but he is just as happy to be working on his next exhibitions.  In the new year he will seek more temporary work, but for now he is content to create art.  So wonderful to chat with him and hear how encouraged he is about life these days.  

Our federal government is currently in chaos. What will the new year hold for Canada?  I am almost afraid to find out on one hand, on the other hand MAYBE there is hope for our future??  At least the provincial premiers seem to be banding together to present a united front on some upcoming possible problems our country could face by the end of January.

My husband is working on his sermon for this coming Sunday morning.  Studying and writing and presenting his findings are the things in his life that make him the most happy and content.  So, I am very happy that he has more such assignments coming up in the new year.

I braved the freezing, bitter wind and thick ice outside this afternoon and crab walked the garbage out to the bin in the parking lot. On very cold days, that short distance seems to have tripled. Add in a cane and the walking speed of a snail on the ice and my taking out the garbage turns into a major chore! BUT it is at least a teensy bit of exercise.

Speaking of which, I have located the physio exercises I practised after my last hip surgery, so will try out some of the easier ones to see if I can do them at all without exacerbating my current hip issues.  I will need to do physio before the surgery, even though I have not yet been called in for the final assessment at the hip and joint clinic, so better to get started slowly on some of these exercises before all my leg and thigh muscles completely atrophy.  The first level of hip surgery recovery exercises are very easy, but it is the daily repetition that brings back the strength.  Doubt I will get much beyond the first level as I don't want to overdo things and cause more damage, but it is a good start while I wait for that important final assessment call.  The friend of a friend did what I may have to do eventually:  went out of province for her surgery and the very day of the surgery, received the call right here at home that she had been assigned a surgery date due to the surprise cancellation of another waiting patient.  I DO NOT want to spend tens of thousands of dollars by ending up in that position myself! The poor woman....how upset must she have been after spending nearly thirty thousand dollars out of pocket when by waiting just a few more days she could have had the costs covered by her provincial health care.  She must have been devastated.

I suppose it is time to go and coordinate my and my husband's grocery lists and combine them into one list for tomorrow. Then I will have to be creative about what to have for my dinner tonight.  There is a turkey burger left over from last night's meal that I have set aside for my hsuband to have with red potato hashbrowns and fried onions, so perhaps it is my best night to have taco chips with salsa and diced olives....hmmmm....a treat that I don't have very often. Sounds yummy at this moment.....

Weeeeeeellllll.....Some Of OUR Family Christmases Have Been Almost As Strange....Hohoho.....

 I love the following poem.  While of course what it is describing is deliberately exaggerated and silly, some of our own past Christmas celebrations certainly captured the spirit of the gatherings the poet so wonderfully conveys below:

"A Traditional Family Christmas

--Brian Bilson

It wasn't until that first Christmas with your family

that I realized we all do it differently.

How every family forges its own traditions as bright

and distinct as any giant, shining star.

The way you laid out coal sacks instead of stockings;

The recital of a limerick before the opening of each present; Christopher Lee's heavy metal Christmas album playing quietly in the background; 

the pre-breakfast snorkel;

The dance of the Seven Baubles; 

the festive epaulets;

the suet potatoes, and sweet and sour popcorn;

the replenishing of glasses with red turkey wine;

Sprout-rolling in the park, the posting of a tinsel stick

through Mr. Jenning's letter box; 

and back for an evening of TV

(some classic episodes of Panorama) 

and games (Hoist the Pickle, No Elbows Please, Speculum)

then bed.

The following year you came to my family for Christmas.

You later said it was wierd."

You may now draw your own conclusions as to what kind of Christmases we experienced in our earlier years....sigh.....

More Blasts From The Past, Hahaha!!

 My husband downloaded a whole bunch more photos from the 1970's and 1980's into my photo files and some of them are hysterical. They are too funny not to share with ya'll, hahahahahahahaha....

I wasn't the greatest fan of Santa Clause, hence the stundo look!

Christmas 1966: cat's eye frames were all the rage....eeeuck!!!

Farmer Sue: at my aunt's farm in Saskatchewan in 1966....do I look rural enough??

Paternal grandparents and my dad in 1966...first night of tenting and almost the last!

Me 'n' Mom and my maternal grandparents 1968

My little cousin convinced me to ride her pony by myself...it didn't end well.....

At the Calgary Zoo Conservatory 1969  Paisley was SO big that year...eek!

A Summer Sunday Morning in 1970...no paisley at least.

1972: the Peak of the Knitted Poncho Era!! Aiii yiiii...

Me 'n' Mom on a mountain picnic...middle of the Bell Bottom Era

Dad lived for summer mountain picnics and Mom would pack a huge lunch!

Mom's and Dad's first trip to Hawaii in 1975

My Visiting Inlaws in 1978

Dad in full School Principal Mode in 1978

My Fam at New Years 1979

And now, you will all be pleased to know, my dinner is calling me and I must go and eat...you are released from the bondage of sharing my family memories, which seem to be assailing me from all sides this Christmas season.  I have left over Indian food awaiting me: chana, coconut pepper chicken, rice, veggie samosa, raita, salad, naan and mango rice pudding.  We went to DarBar for lunch after church today and half our lunch platter combos came home with us. YUM!!  Thanks for your patience all of you with my trip down memory lane.