Wherein taking the easy way ended badly

Who doesn't like to do things easily?  When presented with options that will end at roughly the same end, who doesn't say "I'll do it the way that takes less time."?

Smart people, that's who.

Yesterday, I decided to use my holidays to start some sewing projects I had been putting off.  I hauled my machine upstairs to where the light is better and hauled all my supplies up with it.

Except my iron.  I decided to heck with it I wasn't going to iron the material first.  I wasn't going to need to iron it in place before I sewed.  It was going to be a simple pillow case.  How hard could it be?

Then I decided to cut without measuring.  I figured I could eyeball it pretty well.  I just had to use the straight edge as a guide and I would be fine.  Also, there was a pattern on the material.  I could just follow that too.  It will all work out.

Finally, I needed to sew a fold into the material with an attached ribbon.  Two birds with one stone, thought I.  I will just hold the ribbon in place and sew the fold as I would normally.  It will all be fine.


I wish I could go back in time and punch myself in the nose.

The material had been cut at the store, that is true. It did have a straight edge.  However, it's bias was crooked.  Which means that the pattern on the material was on there wrong.  Just a little to the side.  What should have been simple following a path already in place, turned out to be misguided at best.  Had I noticed this right away, I could have done something about it.

The fold that I needed to create started out crooked.  I realized that in order to make it follow the material pattern, I would have to adjust the fold somehow.  More material on the one side, less on the other.  Pin and pin and I give up! Let's just sew it.


Cue the cursing.  The fold was crooked.  The ribbon pulled in some places and not in others.  The sewing missed the ribbon altogether at some points.  I ripped it all out.

I went to get the damn iron.

Well, it's not dead yet: Adventures in Gardening

Anyone who knows anything about me knows I kill plants.  Dead.

Despite having two sets of Grandparents who were avid gardeners and kept beautiful gardens and flowers, I inherited my mother's ability to wither a plant with a look.  I blame my hatred of all things green and leafy on my family's summer garden in which I was forced to spend most of my youth toiling under the hot sun.

I also walked uphill both ways to school.

This year with our yard finally looking awesome, I decided it was high time to plant stuff.  I had one giant garden box that was left for us by the previous owners and three beautiful flower boxes The Guy created for me last year.  I decided to brave the growing world (pun!) and plant some stuff.

I decided to go small.  Two zucchini plants, two tomato plants, one squash.  One row of onions.  Two of lettuce and three of carrots.  Here it is in all it's glory.  The carrots are 3 millimetres high now.  The weeds are taller.

My garden.
If you look REALLY closely on the left, you can see carrots.

The Guy surprised me one day when I got home from a conference.  He had planted to flower boxes for me. You can see they are doing quite well! That would be because I'm not in charge.

Charles is.  Wow! 80s sitcom call back!

Flower box in front of the house

The Guy planted stuff that "looked pretty" and said they were appropriate for our yard temps.  The front ones get little to know sun and the front are BLAZING IN THE HOT SUN all day.  Well, you know... when it's not raining.

One of the flower boxes in the back.

Now, the only problem is that since they have been planted it has rained so much the flowers are moldy!!  I had to go all Queen of Hearts on them and cut off their heads.  I hope they make a full recovery.

If not, I will be planting silk flowers next year.  I hear they almost look real.

I bet even I could keep those alive.

MayB & The Guy 2 gether 4 ever

Remember being in high school and doodling the name of the person you were hopelessly infatuated with?  Over and over again.

Mrs. Bronwyn Feldman 

Mrs. Bronwyn Slater

Mrs. Bronwyn Swayze

Alas, what teenage girl hasn't done something along those lines.  Sometimes, even with boys who weren't movie stars but equally out of my reach.  Mrs. Bronwyn Howden.  Sigh.

Of course, now that high school alumni will stumble across this and be horrified.  Whatever.  He was red-headed and tall.  In those days, that was all it took.

I liked to take my teenage dreams and ramp it up a notch.  No sense just doing something half way.

Like the time I drew a huge heart on my hand and doodled my name plus a short dorky guy I had a crush on in Grade 8.  Then, when the cool girls caught a glimpse of my hand and mocked me (and him undoubtedly) I was stuck spending the entire recess trying to erase all records of it with soap that smelled like chemicals and paper towel that could take the paint off a car, but not the ink off my hand.

You would think I would have learned after that embarrassment, but alas, teenage girls are stupid.

In Grade 10 algebra, I took stalking and moping to a whole new level.

I started inserting the guy's name into my algebra equations.  You know how x= 2+5?  Well, in my book it went like this

i = 2+5
l = 3-4
o=4x6-8
v=3/4 x 4/6
e=14+5/7
b=26-5x45-13
r=3-7x2
a=2x5-37x2

You get the picture.

Imagine my horror, when after finishing an hour worth of assignments in my notebook, we were told to pass our books up the row so another classmate could correct our work.

Thank God I used a pencil.

Baking quiche for dummies by dummies.

Despite my lack of cooking prowess, I have decided to share my considerable knowledge about quiche with you.  That knowledge is this: I have eaten quiche a couple of times and have made it once.  But I have the Internet, an idea and a crap load of eggs.  So here we go!

Mini quiche in muffin form (Gluten free)

Now, first off.  When you think to yourself: Self, why do you need a family size package of eggs?  This is why.

Two lonely little eggs left.

Now, I will give you the recipe for one batch of muffins.  I doubled this -- hence the fact I used up all the eggs.  Also, I made oatmeal chocolate chips cookies (non-Gluten Free) for my husband because I am the greatest wife ever.

You need:

6 eggs
1 cup of milk
3/4 cup of GF Bisquik (which we picked up in the states!) or Bob's Red Mill Gluten Free Biscuit Mix (available anywhere)

Here it is.  Eggs, milk, Bisquick in a bowl.  Mixed.

Second, oil the muffin tins.  Either with a non-stick spray or oil on a paper towel.  Put a bit more on the bottom only.  It gets sticky.  Also, start the oven.  350 degrees is good.

Next, you need filling for the quiche.  You will see below that I have cheese, cheese and tomato, and cheese and spinach.  I also made ham and cheese ones which turned out the best.  The tomatoes made the bottom too soggy, so I'm not sure I would do that again.  Or, I would add the ingredients to the top.  I don't know.  I'm not a professional.

Obviously.

Mmm.  Toppings.

Finally, take the egg mix and fill in the cups.  I used a 1/4 cup measuring cup and filled them that way.  It's up to you.  I'm not the boss of you.  Well, I'd like to be, but you're really making it tough.

Voila! Filled muffin quiches.

You will toss these bad boys onto the middle oven rack for 30 or 35 minutes.  My oven is a wuss, so it took the full 35.  They will look all golden and delicious when they are done.

The left has been cooking for 10 mins already.
The right just went in moments before.

Pull those gorgeous creatures out when they are getting golden around the edges.  Let them cool, run a knife around the edges, and presto! You have muffin quiches.

Mmmm.  Goodness.

Now, The Guy who despises all egg things admitted that these smell pretty dang awesome.  I'm pretty pleased if I do say so myself!

Maybe random: definitely irritating, choosing, and dog stories

Do you ever just stop and realize how intensely annoying you are?  Sometimes I am minding my own business and BAM my own irritating personality defects punch me in the face.

I start all conversations with "So, ..."  It is like I cannot just start a conversation.  I cannot just give you a piece of information, I have to prefice it with something like we were already talking about it or like it's a bit of bad news I really didn't want to have to tell you.

So, I think you're a knob. 

So, I heard the other day that you smell terrible.

So, there was this time I pretended to be listening, but was totally trying to remember all 50 states.

Seriously, HOW ANNOYING AM I????

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I couldn't fall asleep last night because I was trying to remember all 50 states.  Alphabetically.  But then, I lost count so didn't know if I got them all and had to start over. 

It was exhausting.
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Today, I couldn't decide if I wanted ice cream for a snack or chips. 

 I had both, but in small bowls so I wouldn't feel bad about myself.

They were both good, so I don't even know who should have won.
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The dog and I play a lot of fetch in the house.  I'm a terrible thrower so this causes no end of stress for The Guy because I will often send the ball veering off in some odd direction as hard as I can throw.  Most of the times it is at the wall just left of the doorway.

Tonight, I threw the ball into the spare room.  Monty chased after it and didn't come back.  I went into the spare room to find him staring at the ball which had rolled behind the rocking chair.  With another ball that had been there earlier.

I moved the chair and let him go in after the balls.  He picked up one, dropped it, and moved to pick up the other.  Then he stopped, looked at me in confusion and left the room.

It was like Sophie's Choice, but he played it smart.
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The stupid computers still have 17 hours and 15 minutes left in their syncing.

The Guy told me this is because I am doing the transfer wirelessly.

That is also why neither of our Blackberry's can pick up the WiFi either.  He blames me for this, but really if I shouldn't have done it why did they give me the option?

I'm going to punch elderly Bill Gates twice for that.



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Remember that to the right of this post is the subscription options.  To the underneath of this post (yes, that's a term.... shut up, you're stupid) is some like buttons and some tweet buttons and a share button.  USE THEM. 

I mean, if you want to.  It would be okay with me.

Maybe this was a bad idea

I bought a new computer this weekend.  IT's been over four years since I got my last one and a new hard drive and power cord later, it's seen better days.  It also doesn't help that I drop it on the floor at least once a week.  Don't worry though, it's usually on the carpet.

So, after some basic research and some scoping the net for suggestions, I finally settled on a type of computer I wanted.  Then, I went to the store and found a completely different one I ended up buying.

At least I bought it for the right reasons and not because it was pretty.  That was an option.  They come in colours now!  Shiny!

As I was getting things together to make my purchase, the cumputer geek at the store suggested I use their team to transfer my files from my old computer to my new one.  I scoffed at the thought.  I have numerous friends who are computer freaks so I didn't need to pay $100 for someone else to do it.  I figured a cheap supper or something and I would rolling.

Then I opened it up.  It's so pretty!!  And new!!!  It still has that new computer smell -- meaning that I haven't eaten anything near it yet and it doesn't smell like fermented cheese. 

What? I get hungry when I'm working. 

Okay, when I'm playing Tetris on Facebook.  Shut up.

But what I realized when I opened it up was that I did not intend to let it out of my sight.  Not even for the evening it would take for it to be set up.  I could do it myself.  I know I can!  At my office, I'm a computer genius!

The fact that most people in my office were in their late 30s when computers became mainstream is not lost on me.  Big fish in a little pond. 

I got through the initial set up alright.  I followed the directions and went to town.  Finally, I got to the last stage of the process -- transfering files.  With Window EASY Transfer.

Easy, my butt.

Setting it up was easy enough.  I picked all the things I wanted on my new computer.  Things I couldn't live without.  And I started the transfer.  I knew that with the vast amount of things on my computer (ie: every picture ever taken of my family since the begining of time) the transfer would take awhile.  It told me 4 hours. 

Okay, I can handle that.

However, as each moment goes by, the stupid program tacks on another hour.  I'm now at 1 day and 18 hours. 

I want to punch Bill Gates in the throat.  Mind you, I will need to wait until I can access my computer so I can google where he lives.

He's going to be a really surprised 80 year old.

Faults, I have a few

I blame most of my bad traits on my father.  This may or may not be true, but I feel someone should be to blame for things like: adoring bad puns, farting like a machine gun, and making anything sound like the truth if you lie convincingly enough.

I figure someone should be held responsible.  I know I'm not to blame, so it must be genetically inclined.

I chew my nails.  I know I got this from my father as I can count the number of times I have seen him with fingernails on my terribly chewed fingernails.

My mother had gorgeous nails without even trying.  My sisters have gorgeous nails.  My brother... well, he has my father's hands but with slightly less ravaged nails.  And then there is me and my dad.

This is not the bonding I wanted.

I have chewed my nails from the time I figured out I could put them in my mouth.  I would get in trouble from people for doing it, but then I would try and hide it behind a blanket, a book, etc.  This also goes for picking my nose, but I don't want to talk about that.

I chew on my nails out of being bored, being lonely, being nervous, being hungry, not being hungry, not being bored, being happy, being awake.  Heck, I chew them in my sleep.

It starts out with good intentions.  I plan to stop chewing my nails.  I get a manicure and put on polish.  I keep them meticulously filed.

Then I tear one on the top or the corner.  It goes downhill from there.

The worst is when I am watching movies in the dark theatre.  Or, when I'm reading a particularly intense book.  Or, when I'm driving.

You get the picture.

I'm not sure what happened this week.  I'd been quite good -- longish nails that were starting to drive me crazy being too long.  Nails are frustrating when you don't usually have them.  They get things under them.  They get in the way of typing.  They stab your finger as you write with a pen.  Suddenly, I have no nails, they are bleeding and it hurts to touch anything.

It's a vicious cycle.

Last night, I painted my nails and most of my fingertips in nail polish.  I'm back on the wagon to being able to peel a sticker off a book.  I have high hopes for these nails.  I'm sure they will be lovely.

Thank God I cannot put my toes in my mouth.

The worst waitress in the world: my career choice at 20

I decided it was time to continue my life in stories.  So far, I've done from years 1 to 19. 

After my disastrous attempt to go to school in a different city, I dropped out.  I decided to branch out into the world of the employed.

After numerous failed attempts to join the minions of the minimum wage, I was chosen to start as a waitress at the Elephant and Castle.  I think that I clinched the interview by telling the manager that I wanted to make her proud of me.  Can you say issues?

The next week I was decked out in my waitressing attire -- black pants, red polo shirt and a smile.  I had high hopes for me.

I should have known.

Why would someone who can hardly walk across an empty room without falling down think she could balance a tray of anything while crossing a crowded restaurant?

My first day was a disaster.  I was settled with a nice family with a little boy.  They ordered drinks, I put them in the system.  They ordered food.  The little boy ordered fish and chips.  The food never came.

Know why?  Yeah, I forgot to put it in the system.  They left in a flurry of anger and starving cries of a toddler.

It went down hill from there.

One day, I had a tray of 4 iced teas.  I carefully balanced them all and braced myself because there was a cute boy at the table with his parents.  I walked slowly and gracefully towards the table.  Up one step -- all good.  One more step -- I made it.

Then I tripped on my shoelace and dumped the entire tray in his lap.

Another day, they sent me to work on the mezzanine.  That is a fancy word for second floor with a circling metal staircase.  I had a couple of tables -- nothing too strenuous -- and very little to actually do.  However, it meant climbing up and down those stairs for everything: drinks, food, bills, etc.

I was heading up the stairs with a freshly brewed pot of coffee in one hand and a pint of beer in the other when disaster struck.  Again, it came in step form.  I tripped on the landing and fell face first.  One arm over one edge of the landing and one arm over the other.

Did I mention there were tables near the steps?  Yup.  Once couple got a lunch full of ale.  The other, a lap full of coffee.

That was my last day working as a waitress.  They moved me upstairs to cover the horse racing crowd.  I spent the rest of my career pouring coffee for Greek men who bet hundreds and left no tips.

And the waitress who replaced me on the main floor?

Only spoke Spanish.

Making the JWs run away

For some reason, every house I've lived in has come with it's own set of Jehovah's Witnesses.  They come around every few months to drop off literature and see if I'm willing to join them on the dark side at their church.

When I moved into my first apartment, a mid-twenties girl showed up at my apartment.  She asked if she could come in and talk, so -- being that I was lonely and completely naive -- I let her in.  It took me about 20 minutes to realize she was a JW, but I liked her and she wasn't very pushy so we chatted quite some time.  She visited me about 3 times before being horribly injured in a skiing accident.  Two stern middle-aged women replaced her and it took me ages to figure out how to kick them out of my apartment.  In the end, I just stopped answering the door.  I would listen to them shuffle outside my apartment and hope they couldn't hear me breathing.  I felt like I was in a terribly lame movie about a girl being chased to her death by women in long flowered dresses and heavy shoes.

When I moved back to my home city, a pair of JWs arrived on my doorstep within days of moving in.  I felt like I had been sold out by the Welcome Wagon who had arrived first with baskets of goodies and coupons only to pass my name on as someone who will open her door to strangers.  This pair of JWs was not as sweet as my first visitor, but not as off putting as her replacements.  They continued to come back to the house though I assured them I was happy with my own church and that I did know about Jesus - thank you very much.  Finally, I decided to turn their tactics against them.  I had a handout from one of our church functions, so made a point of trying to make them take it and read it and get back to me on what they thought.

They never came back.

When I finally bought my own home, a new group came by.  Despite me frightening them with bad hair, they continued to return to the house.  For my 30th birthday, I allowed myself to ask the most determined of the group to stop coming by.  It worked.  Until I moved again.

Now, in our new place, we've had a couple of drive by JWs.  They come, ring the bell, and by the time I get there they hand me some paperwork and carry on.  None seem to want to make conversation.

It could be that every one of them have come before 10am.  Anyone who knows me know I am not awake before 10am very often.  And certainly never willingly.

This morning, I stumbled from bed with the dog barking madly because the door bell has rung.  I threw a zip up sweater on over my tank top and tripped over the dog getting to the door.  Two men stood there.  They mumbled something, thrust a paper into my hand and almost ran down the steps.  I was glad it didn't take long, but was confused by their reaction.  That is, until I went into the bathroom and looked in the mirror.

One boob was not fully covered by the tank top.

I may be put on the "do not contact" list after this.

Complacent -- smug and proud of it

This word was provided by Miss Gina and is my last word for the month!

When I think of complacent, I think of someone who is apathetic to the situation around them and thus does nothing to fix it.  Imagine my surprise when I looked it up and discovered it  means confident and lends itself to being smug.

Why do I feel like this word is a big "hint hint", Gina?  (Just kidding.  I know you don't think I'm smug.  Well, I think you don't.  You don't, right??)

I like to be smug.  When I get to be smug, it means I have something on someone else and it likely means I'm funnier and even smarter than that person.  I LOVE THAT.  My lip twitches just a bit on the right hand side.  I think I can hide it, but I can't.  Even my smug isn't subtle.

The world has a sense of humour though and won't let me get away with that for very long.  Every time I get a little smug, I get knocked back onto my butt with a healthy dose of Hey You're Not So Great.

The world can bite me.

Today was another example of that regularly scheduled dosage.  I've been feeling pretty good about things.  I'm the good granddaughter.  I make my siblings look like ungrateful wretches.  I can balance home life and dog life and husband life and family life and I can do it with style!  I also get nominated for being funny!  I can be funny and still be sane!

And then fate says Oh yeah?

After a late end to my shift, I came home with intentions of: spending time with my husband, playing with my dog, making lunch, blogging, and hopefully squeezing in some Tetris before bed.  I merrily went on my way making my lunch. cleaning up as I went along, chatting with The Guy and throwing the rope for the dog.  I grabbed the veggie container off the counter and -- as I opened the fridge -- I saw it all go wrong in slow motion.

The lid popped off the container; the door slipped out of my hand.  The container drooped under the weight of the veggies and every single piece of vegetable hit the floor.

As I was on my hands and knees trying to gather up errant carrots, I glanced up at The Guy grinning at me from across the room.

I think they will need to be washed.

Moving out on my own and embarrassing myself: Being 19

All my other stories about my life are here.

When I turned 19, I decided I was going to move out.  First, I left to work on the bee farm, and from there moved to Saskatoon for university.  It was all part of my grand plan to be independent.

I rented a tiny bachelor suite in a building that smelled like cat pee.  It was within walking distance from the University and moments from two of my good friends.  The window was broken, the heat was always on, the door didn't lock correctly, and it was on the same block as a half-way house.  I loved it.

While it wasn't the place to be all the time, my small home became a regular hangout for a few friends -- like the one who came to stay for a week and never moved out -- and we were all comfortable just hanging out watching my 2 TV channels and listening to my neighbours speak loudly in Chinese.

One afternoon, my roommate, myself and a good friend (who is a male) were hanging out.  I got a phone call from A BOY! who I was crazy about.  He was coming over to my place to hang out with us until it was time to go out with our whole group of friends.  I tried to be nonchalant about the whole thing.  I calmly got off the phone, announced that A BOY! was coming over and I got up off the couch where I had been sitting.

In my mind, I quietly tidied the room, put laundry away, and relaxed in quiet anticipation of his presence.

I forgot that I'm as subtle as a punch to the junk.

What actually happened is this: I leapt off the couch and dashed around the room gathering things into a laundry hamper.  I started hiding things I thought would be embarrassing and then I went and changed my clothes.  In my mind, it was a subtly sexy outfit that would play off my best features and make me more desirable.

Remember that thing about subtly?

I changed into a coloured bra (likely teal as it was my favourite) and a white dress shirt.  I tucked this ensemble into my tight cowboy jeans (I was attempting to be a cowgirl those days) and put on my leather belt with shiny buckle.  I then redid my make-up, put on the brightest red lipstick I owned, and redid my hair.

I finally settled back on the couch looking like an early 20s version of Tammy Faye Baker.

It wasn't until that moment that I noticed my male friend staring at me as though I had lost my mind and had my head spin around in circles while spitting pea soup.  He hadn't known anything about my particular obsession and had been quite surprised.

Years later (14 to be exact) my friend is still telling the story about the time he watched me lose my mind over A BOY!

Thank God, I grew up.

How "butt" leads to "gluten" and vice versa

Last night, Janny and I hit the town.  We had ourselves a monstrous supper at Montana's where the waitress plopped my meal in front of me with a "1/4 chicken no gluten" like as though other people order chicken with gluten.  After eating too much and both wishing we had brought our eatin' pants, we decided to kill some time before the movie by hitting up the local Chapters.

I mean, on a night out on the town, a bookstore should always be involved.

We wandered around and I loaded up on sale items and the most expensive date book ever.  Then, we checked out the new computers they had installed for items search.  Janny commented on how the computers were Macs, but had no Mac icons.  I noted it had no mouse and for the life of me I didn't know how to get from one area of the page to another.

We figured we should try a search to figure it out.  Being that we are both of the most mature sort, we entered the word "butt".

A couple of books showed up (like The Time My Butt Exploded -- awesome!) and the screen showed there were more pages of options.  We tabbed around and pushed the arrows, etc.  It was so frustrating.

Finally, I stabbed my finger at the screen on the arrow showing more pages.  It moved!  I got super excited.  Just then, a staff person came by to offer some assistance.  We assured him we had figured it out, so were fine.  He moved on.

Then I looked at what was on the second page.  Gluten Free Cookbooks!  I looked at Janny and said "How did it get to Gluten Free stuff?  How did it know?"

Janny replied, "Well, we did type in butt".

It was then we heard the staff person burst out laughing.  I guess he hadn't moved on very far.

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For clarification: the author of the Gluten cookbooks is named Butt.  Also, I figured it was fair that "butt" would lead to "gluten" because, for me, "gluten" always leads to "butt".

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The last post was my 2,000 post.  I love that it is about Remembrance Day.

Inside out: the story of the grad dress

The start of the story was here.

I graduated in 1994.  It was smack in the centre of some of the worst fashion choices ever.  During the day, we wore a lot of plaid, oversized pants, our father's suit jackets, and chunk ugly boots.  When we dressed up, we preferred velvet dresses that reached the floor and chunky heels.  Looking back, nothing actually fit us.

When it came to graduation, I did not want to be like the other girls I knew -- the ones who spent hundreds of dollars on a dress they would wear to a supper, a lame dance, and then throw up on after getting sick on smuggled in booze.  I wanted something different and unique and, apparently, super shiny.

I started designing my perfect dress.  I took one of my sisters' old paper dolls and -- using her as a body template -- started drawing.  I wanted something semi-off the shoulder (despite the fact I already had the shoulders of the line backer) and something semi-low cut.  It should be well fitted, but not so much that my "fat rolls" (like I knew what fall rolls were) would show.

Finally, after a hundred versions (or three) I was ready.  My friend, Rae, and I had a seamstress and she said she could make the dress to my specs.  I was pumped.  We went out and found material that would be perfect for it.  My material was shiny, emerald green and slippery.  I loved it.  The wrong side of the material was a dark green, creepy feeling, weird looking material.

The day of our first fitting, I was super excited to see my creation in real life.  The seamstress brought out the dress and laid it out in front of me in anticipation.  My heart sank.  The dress was inside out.  The ugly, dark green, creepy side was out for the world to see.

I tried it on and it fit perfectly.  I was polite and thanked her for her time.  We would come back again for one more fitting.  We left and I'm pretty sure I broke into tears.

My friend took pity on me and called the seamstress, telling her about the dress, and asking her to fix it.  Thankfully, because it is the epitome of bad 90s fashion choices.

It just wouldn't have been the same otherwise.

Freedom of speech

Today, I spoke to the media for the first time.  I was speaking on behalf of a coallition of unions and representing some very underpaid people.  Let me get this straight though.  I am well paid.  In the last 2 years, my agency has received the wages we should have been receiving from the beginning.  This allows me to speak on other's behalf as I was once in their shoes and understand the importance of the change to wage parity*.

I spoke to that with two news groups and three radio groups.

Not even 3 hours later, one of the radio groups messed with my recording and made it sound like I was complaining about *my* wage.

So, now I'm angry at the press.  I'm feeling betrayed and -- where I had been feeling like a champion for the powerless -- I now feel like a first class chump.

So, if you hear Gormly go on about me on his "news talk" show, know this:  That's not what I said.

I just hope to God the television people do a better job.  Sigh.


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Update: I can't spell.  Thanks to JAG for reminding me that it is "parity" not "parody" though technically, with those wages, it could be either!

Sweet Sixteen: the year I found rugby and beat people up

My life in stories can be found here.  Start at the beginning though or you'll think I'm aging backwards.

Is there anything worse than being a teenager?  I mean, other than a parent of a teenager?  I think not.  A friend from high school and I were talking the other day after my year fifteen post and she reminded me that what I thought about myself was not how others perceived me.  And then, she reminded me about rugby.

I don't know what made me try out for rugby.  I don't remember, but what I know that when I stepped on the field I knew I belonged there.  The toughest of the tough girls and the fastest of the scrawny girls gathered together to play a game normally reserved for guys.

It was the first year that a girls league was starting in the city and we took to it with passion.  We practiced our hearts out -- running, tackling, scrumming, laughing.  We had comradery even with girls who wouldn't have spoken with us on the school grounds.  We compared bruises and injuries and tackle techniques.  We were suddenly smiling when we used to act sullen and hide from the world.

I loved it.  I loved the scrum (huddle like thing) where we all interlocked.  I was the 8 Man.  The muscle and power at the back end of the scrum.  I held people up and pushed them forward.  That was my role.  Then, when the scrum was finished, I got to run like hell and hit whoever had the ball.  It was everything I loved all rolled into one.

As a teen, I was angry.  I was angry at me and the world and my parents and my siblings and my school and... well, you get the point.  In rugby, I found a place for my anger and violent tendencies that did not involve getting me arrested.  And I was good at it.  I was big, solid, fearless, and would have run directly into a train knowing I could at least slow it down.  I spent a great deal of that season with major bruising and numerous concussions, but I was happy.

After high school, I didn't get to play again.  I worked two jobs right out of school.  I went straight into university while still working and then moved to Saskatoon for a few years.  It's sad that I have glory days that I look back on, but those moments on the field were the happiest of my teenage life.

I'm the one with the arrow pointing at her head.

Even if I was unconscious a lot.

Fifteen: The year I don't remember but learned to drive

A year ago this month, I started telling stories about my life.  And then I got distracted -- likely by something shiny -- and never finished it.  I am here to rectify this. 

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For some reason, when I get to 15 years of age I am stumped to think of a story.  Seriously, I got nothing.  It's like 15 was either so unoriginal or so traumatic that I blocked most of it from my memory.  It is possible that it was both.  Teenagers are like that.

I am sure of the time lines and I think I was in Grade 10 that year.  I might have had my first real boyfriend that summer (if "real" is considered on and off for an entire week!) and I know that it was the fall where a well-meaning teacher introduced me to the class as the girl who tries out for all sports and never gets on a team.

But then, I remembered that I learned how to drive when I was 15.  Well, 15 and a half, but we won't split hairs.  Suddenly a plethora of stories flooded my brain.  And here we go...

In my high school, we were offered driver training.  It happened a couple of days a week, after school -- in a classroom.  You know, where all driver training should be.  I spent a month or two (who can remember now!) taking classes, reading on rules of the road, watching videos of accidents, and thinking about driving.  After all that, I wrote my exam and was pronounced ready to drive!

At this point, I had still never sat behind the wheel other than to be in control of the heater when my parents left us in the car to go grocery shopping.  But that didn't stop my father.

One day, Dad announced we would start with me driving.  We got into the van and I don't know how but we drove a little ways down the street.  My dad was a farm boy who likely drove his first vehicle at 6 years old, so I don't think it dawned on him that I had never in my life put my foot on the gas pedal.  And yet, here we were, driving Ky to her friend's house.

It was a disaster.  I didn't know how hard to press the gas, the brake pedal seemed to slam the van to a stop, and I had no idea how to keep the van on the road or between the lines.  I seem to remember there being a lot of yelling.

Much of my driver training went badly.  I'm not sure how much of that had to do with the teacher or the student.  Well, a lot of it had to do with the student.

One of my first excursions resulted in me driving the van beside a Loraas bin and clipping the side of the van on the metal extensions used to lift the bin.  Next, I turned into a parking lot and caught the edge of the van siding on an electric pole.  It did not damage the van at all, but cleanly slid the siding out of the metal that held it in place.  Shortly after that, I tore the side view mirror off as I pulled into the garage.

Much of my student driver experience was like that.  I had difficulty staying in the lines on the road.  I could not figure out how to change lanes safely in front of another vehicle.  I couldn't figure out how long it should take to change lanes.  It was all a disaster.

After awhile, we figured out a system.  The middle line of the road had to disappear into the far corner of my windshield.  That way, I stayed in the lines.  It took three dots on the road to change from one lane to the other.  (Although, this does not apply on the highway which I found out by scaring all the occupants of the vehicle to near death.)  There had to be a small amount of the road showing between me and the car in front of me when pulling to a stop light.  And on, and on.

It was 5 years before they discovered I had no depth perception.  I got a pair of glasses and, suddenly, the world made sense.  Unfortunately, the damage had been done.  I had been taught to drive by my father.

NaBloPoMo and prizes

Since I announced my intentions of participating in the "write a post every day for a month" thing, I decided to also provide a prize for the other participants.  I'm nice that way.  Well, not really, but I thought it would be a good thing.

Also, being that I am a crazy knitting fiend these days, I figured it should be something knitted!  Why not the first thing I ever knit?

So, I present to you, the scarf which will be auctioned off to someone who is also taking part in NaBloPoMo.

Now, the bow tied there has since been sewn into the scarf and the colour is more of a teal, but that is the scarf.  I've never actually worn it despite being so proud of it!  It's the softest material ever and I love it.  I hope that whomever inherits it will love it to. 

I've also decided that during this month, I will have a give away of another scarf for my readers!  Minues my father who lives on the far edges of the earth, everyone who comments (on the post that I claim is the post on which to comment) will be enetered to win.  And then I will pick someone randomly that I like best. 

I mean....

Randomly!

So, here it is.  The begining of NaBloPoMo and the prizes attached. 

Phew. That took me a long time.

The universe was messing with us today

The Guy and I went out to a restaurant tonight with a gift card his parents had given us. To get to the restaurant, we had to take a 10 minute detour.  It led us to a traffic light that didn't change colour and a pile of sand on someone's driveway that had been shaped into three dolphins.

Finally we arrived at the restaurant, ordered our food, had our meal, and... waited.  The people behind us -- who arrived after us by about 20 minutes -- got their bill, carried on, and were replaced by another couple who were waited on.  Other people came and went too.

No one noticed we might want our bill.  Eventually, the waitress dropped off the bill with the typical "There's no hurry" line they like to give.  And there wasn't.  Any hurry.  At all.

For 15 minutes we sat there, with the gift card and some cash to cover the fact Peach Bellini's were on sale, while the waitress flitted too and fro.  The restaurant filled up to the brim, people waited for our table, but still we sat.  It was bizarre.  Finally, she came and took our money so we could leave what had become our well-decorated hell.

Then we went to the store next door to buy a cheap mouse pad.  At first we weren't noticed -- you know, the typical customer service these days where you ignore anyone walking into a building -- but then a nice young man came up and helped me when I practically yelled "I'm not paying $20 for a mouse pad!".  When he figured out the prices were marked wrong, I grabbed what I needed, and walked to the till.  There, I smiled at the dorky little clerk.  He choked on his own spit, mumbled something and ran away.

The Guy and I stood there for enough time to pick out two movies from the under $7 bin.  (What?  The Replacements was a good movie!!)  Then I noticed something else.  The original price tag said $6.98.  The sale price tag?  Said $7.99.  It was just too weird.  Eventually, the same young man from the first time came up to the till.  I explained the error on the DVD and he rang it through.  Yup, it came up at the "sale" price.  He fixed it and we ran to the car.

It was a whole lot of stupid all in one day.  We didn't want to see what else was waiting for us.

Good dog. BAD dog.

On Friday, I took Monty to the vet.  He's become so much more social in the last year, I wasn't nervous at all about taking him to a place where there might be dogs.  We ran a few errands and then showed up at the vet's office nice and early.

Walking in, I noticed a man with a large Border Collie pup hopping and pulling and jumping beside him.  I took my cue from The Dog Whisperer and remained "calm and assertive".  I walked into the lounge as though my dog would not attempt to rip the skull from the hyper dog trying to say hi. 

It worked.  Monty wandered in, took a look at the other dog and promptly ignored her.

I'll take it.

We sat down and waited for our turn.  If he behaved well in the waiting room, he excelled in the vet's office.  He went with the staff with minimal pulling and looking at me over his shoulder with a whine of "Et tu Brutus?" and got himself weighed.  He's the same weight as last year which is 3 years in a row -- a miracle in the household of our family (both dogs and people).

The visit went as scheduled with only a small tooth issue coming up.  We head out to do a couple of more errands before heading home. 

I was hungry, so grabbed a chocolate bar from the local store.  As I ran in to post a parcel to my Dad, I had the thought that I was so happy with how well behaved Monty was, I wasn't even going to worry about the fact I'd left the other half of my chocolate in the car.  His mom?  She would have eaten it from my mouth as I bit down.  But not Monty.  He's a good dog.

I returned to the car to find Monty had eaten the other piece of my Reese Peanut Butter Cup. 

Paper and all.

I guess I was setting us both up to fail.

I went camping and no one died

Despite my pouty face from last week, I did go camping and didn't kill anyone.  I know, I'm surprised too. 

If you know anything about me, it's that I hate camping.  I have always hated camping and you can thank my father for that.  As children, my father would pack us all into the van (with my mother gagged and tied in the back) and drag us out to "nature" for the weekend.  Despite being +40 degrees all summer, the moment we arrived at our destination, it began to ran and didn't stop.  Thus, we all sat in our tent for 3 days being bored and fighting.  At least that's how I remember it.  I am sure my father will have different memories.

To this day, I hate camping.  Why anyone would choose to go somewhere there are no toilets, to sleep on the ground, cook things poorly on a fire that won't start, and sit where the mosquitoes will eat you is beyond me.  For me, camping had damn well better have room service.  I'M A DELICATE FLOWER, PEOPLE.

So we (me, The Guy, his friend and her husband) arrived on Sunday at Duck Mountain and set up camp.  It took about an hour to try and sort through everything.  We had a camper (a 70s motor home complete with shag carpet) and had filled it to the brim.  Finally we had everything settled and got the fire going.  A bottle of Zippo later and it was a nice blaze.  We were joined by some friends and had a great evening talking and laughing.

I should have known it was going too well.

We had heard it might rain on the Monday, so when we went to bed, we pulled the chairs under the awning as a precaution.  Then it started to rain.  It rained for 17 hours without stopping.  It rained cats, dogs, polar bears, and elephants.  It rained until we thought the only way out of the park would be the boat we brought with us.  And so, for the entire day and night, we sat in the camper.  Four adults in one room.  With one place each to sit.

It was good that our friend was along because that's the only reason I wasn't the whiniest person in the camper.  We were all miserable and hungry and tired and dirty and bored and OMG TAKE ME HOME.  By Tuesday afternoon the rain let up.  Our campsite was flooded and there was 2 inches of rain in the bottom of the fire pit, but the boys were making us stay, so we were going to enjoy it.  (Please read "enjoy" as "complain until they either killed us or took us to a hotel")  We started a fire again after pillaging neighbouring abandoned campsites for dry wood and used another container of Zippo.  After a nice time of hanging out by the fire (thanking God that we weren't in the bloody camper at the moment) we headed to bed with the promise that if there were even the slightest sign of clouds we were going home.

No such luck.  Wednesday was clear and warm, so we knew we were stuck.  We finally got the hot water in the camper running, so showered off the grime and some of the grouch.  Sue and I spent the day by the fire reading our books while the guys went out on the boat.  We had a great day.  Thursday was much of the same and we thought we could actually get the hang of this thing.  Except that we really didn't want to.

Friday morning, Sue was up before the sun could remember which direction it was coming from.  We were packed and on the road before 9am.  As we headed out, we made sure the guys understood that, while we'd had a good time for the most part, we were NEVER DOING THIS AGAIN.