Mother Nature Smiles

Yesterday was a great day, wonderful visit with Silvia and to top off the day we experienced the amazing sight of seeing two swans nesting across the street from my house. Over the years I have seen plenty of ducks and geese nesting and one year I saw a loon but this is the first time I’ve seen swans. They are enormous and their necks can do amazing things! I looked out the window this morning to see if they were still there and yes, they are still there. It’s thrilling and I just hope that the cars up and down the road won’t stop and gawk and frighten them away.

It’s early yet but it looks like we are going to have some great sunshine today and so far there is no wind. I plan on getting out for a long walk right after I write my story.

I asked Silvia “what is a baby swan called?” We couldn’t think of the name and so called them swanlings. Of course they are really called cygnets but I had to look it up as I couldn’t remember or remotely recall the name. Why are they called cygnets I have no idea but it must be out of the French as it sounds very French. My my, just glanced at questions and the male is a Cob, the female a Pen and they are Flocks. Good to know (like I’ll remember).

I think the swans are a lucky sign for a good spring. The plan for the day is to spend it outside and clean up the yard as it is very dull and dirty. When I take away all the dead leaves covering the garden patches I hope to see some green struggling through. I may even see some tulips starting up. I notice that the irises and tigerlilies are already well up. They are the hardiest of my flowers. I struggle with the idea of digging out of my front bed but I think I will have to if I am going to have the entry that I am dreaming of.

Well enough chat, today is a day for working outdoors and daylights burning. (In case you don’t know where that comes from, it’s from John Wayne’s The Cowboys and he actually says “your burning daylight” and the young fellow looks around and says “where’s the sun?” as it is still pitch dark. A cute moment).

Here are the swans across from the house.

A Good Cry

Sometimes I read or see something that almost makes my heart burst and I have the sensation of almost crying in my heart. I was reading Richard's blog just now and that is how I felt. This man is one of the most endearing, loving creatures and it makes me ashamed when I don't emulate the values a Christian is supposed to have. He said "Everyone I meet I greet with unconditional love" or words to that effect and it just made me want to cry.
Today please give yourself that pleasure - especially when you are on the road. God bless each and every one of you!

Good Friday 2011

It’s nippy outside and looking a little grey this early in the morning but we are told by our beloved David Spence (the weatherman that I divorce every second day) that it will be “a pleasant weekend” so I’m putting my faith in him and therefore not turning on the heater in the sunroom. My best friend Silvia is coming for a long awaited visit to the completed sunroom so I want everything to be perfect. Unfortunately Erik has to work today so he cannot help with the housekeeping but he did make some efforts before he left this morning so that was nice of him!

What I find amazing is how quickly a house can get unkempt. It seems like I’ve been cleaning thoroughly every week but somehow it always looks like a disaster. John keeps telling me I have to minimize but the word is abhorrent to me. I love my “things”. I love my little ornaments and my pictures. I like to have books and magazines on the table for my guests (and for me) to look at. A girl needs tissue paper around her, doesn’t she?

Ah yes, here I go with the excuses. I hope you know that I am laughing at myself as I write this. As I’ve written before, I am the original Material Girl. I just cannot help myself. And when I see something adorable I have to tell you, I will often just leave it in the store, but then there is so much that is adorable that some of it just HAS to come home with me. A couple of weeks I came home with something and gave it as a gift to my mother and John and Mom both asked, “where’s the other one?” and I looked at them questioningly “what other one?” “You know, you always buy two.” Then I started to laugh and was happy to report that THIS time there was only ONE. But it’s true, alot of times I will buy 2 because I want one for me but then I think it is kind of me to buy another one for a friend. They think I am weird. Why? Isn’t that being generous? They tell me I don’t need one.

I don’t know who woke up and made John and Mom the arbiter of all things Sanne?

Well, I did buy 2 things for Silvia and I. I got 2 darling Thomas Kindle pictures, all framed and with a little plaque with a description of the scene. I bought one for me and the price was so great (my favourite frame shop had 40% off EVERYTHING) that I thought “this would make a great gift for Silvia’s birthday” – now what is wrong with that? Hmmmm? I could have been selfish and just bought for myself.

The kits are out having their frolick so I better brush my teeth and get hussling. Daylights burning!

To all my friends, have a lovely Good Friday. And do take some time to remember what today signifies in our Christian world.

Easter is Hopping Along

Time just seems to run away with me these days. Like everyone else when I was a kid time was forever and a school year was like infinity to me. From September to June took an eternity (and I LIKED school). Nowadays I turn around from January to September and I ask “where did the time go?” It’s already past the middle of April and I cannot account for February or March! I’ve been so busy at work that I am aghast to realize that tomorrow is Good Friday, I thought I had another week!

When I turned 19 I looked back on the previous year and I couldn’t believe that one year had gone by since my graduation. When my sister Charlotte was about 16 (at which point I would have been about 32) I told her that after she graduated she wouldn’t realize how quickly the years rolled away. Later she confessed to me that she thought I was crazy at the time but now, when she was 22 she already realized that I had spoken no more than the truth! How about you? Did it seem like it took forever to become an “adult” and afterwards you keep asking yourself “where did the time go?”

I can only imagine how much quicker the next 50 years are going to be. Don’t kid yourself, I have plans man. I have a goal to live past 100 and when Dr. Bozyk told me that I had high blood pressure AND osteoporosis I had the biggest shock of my life. I told him “but I have plans” which of course he didn’t get (yes, he’d been my doctor for over 20 years but one generally doesn’t reveal oneself to the doctor as being a nutbar!)! All my life I have been the epitome of good health, excellent blood pressure, reflexes, weight was below normal and BAM, I reach 40 and life as I know it goes to hell in a hand basket!

And speaking of baskets, this was supposed to be about approaching Easter . . . . another sign of aging, rambling from one topic to another. J

At Easter we generally have ham and eggs, the eggs in a wonderful mustard sauce that only my mother can make. I can make a good sauce but it never tastes like my mother’s. Why is that? It’s like her lemon mousse, no one can make it like my mother not even the Danish Canadian Club. Husbands who say “but it doesn’t taste like my mother’s” are better off thinking it and not saying it out loud. I remember Jeanette telling me about the first time she made pancakes for her husband.

“My mother makes thin pancakes.” He had the temerity to say.

Jeanette whacked the pan down on the stove so hard the ring nearly broke and yelled

“If you want thin pancakes you can go to your mother for thin pancakes.”

And then stormed out of the kitchen. I nearly killed myself laughing because of course his mother was in Denmark. I don’t think he ever opened his mouth to criticize her cooking again.

What’s your mother’s specialty?

Bad Habits

It is pretty obvious that I am a creature of habit. In fact a friend of mine once said that I needed “structure” in my life. It’s true. I tend to want things to go a certain way once there is a “plan”.

They say that habits are formed within 3 weeks but I think when it comes to bad habits they are formed in 3 hours. In the case of chocolate, 3 minutes! Seriously though it is much easier to develop a bad habit, such as being a couch potato, than it is to be an exercise freak. Yesterday Richard Simmons had a great article on energy and his belief is that energy is a state of mind. I think he is correct because I know I sit in my chair watching TV and telling myself “I’m so tired” until I really believe it. But the truth is I am not tired, I am just lazy. It has gotten into such a state that even when I am home early, the sun is shining and I am energized I will still sit and tell myself that I am tired.

And now I am starting to feel my heart pumping sluggishly. It’s probably all in my mind but I have become alarmed and so I am asking myself “are you going to wait for a heart attack before you do something?” If it was someone else that is what I would be asking and trying to encourage them to get moving and doing. Why can I not motivate myself?

I think we all believe that we are invincible and that we are not really going to die. God will intervene on our behalf. We are special. Well shame on me. It’s time to do all the things I know I ought to do and stop with all these bad habits. (I’m too embarrassed to list them all!) So here’s to finishing breakfast and getting on the treadmill before I get dressed and showered. I can do this!

This is a Beatrix Potter drawing. Don't you love that scowl?

Richard Simmons on Energy

I encourage everyone to read Richard's blog today. It is about energy and where it comes from and I found it very inspirational and motivating. Day - here I come!

Barbie

I was eleven years old when I got my first “Barbie” which was actually a Mitzi doll. Mitzi was a lot prettier than the Barbies of 1964 and equally well made. The Mitzi cost .99 cents and the Barbie was $1.99, a whole dollar difference. With 5 kids (at the time) a dollar made a difference!

I adored my “Barbie” though and after that baby dolls were of no interest to me. In those days you could buy outfits for Barbie and then you would also get a little booklet with all the other outfits you could buy. I don’t think I ever got one outfit that came from Mattel but my girlfriend Susan did and she let me look in one of her booklets. I would pore of them devouring every detail. Oh but I wanted the nurse’s uniform and a particular ball gown so much. I learned to sew my own outfits but as I was a terrible sewer I went in for all the ball gowns as they were easier to make. You didn’t need to make sleeves and the skirts didn’t need to be hemmed if you got a piece of fabric that was an “end” (already bound). I was the genius of shortcuts, let me tell you!

One day my mother heard Susan and I playing at Barbies and we were putting our mink stoles around their shoulders (the mink was a bit of fur I had salvaged from an old slipper of my mother’s) and we were saying “let’s put on our petticoats, it’s so chilly” or something like that. My mother took me aside and told me that petticoats were actually underwear or the slips underneath the dresses. I was shocked and thought she was making it up but I did find out that she was right. I felt so silly calling a mink stole a petticoat but none of my friends knew any different either!

The things we go around assuming!

Saturday Night Fever

By the way, my friend really called it - she mentioned a while ago "I'm waiting for John Travolta to come out to help Kirstie". Sure enough, he was so cute tonight! the Dance Doctor can come visit me any time! :)

End of the Day

The power went out this morning and when I got home this evening my septic tank specialist was here to fix my overflow septic tank. Just call me Noah. Kim was telling me he doesn’t remember the fields ever being so saturated but I told him this is the third time in my experience that we’ve had this kind of overflow. And as for the flooding in my basement, I can hardly count the amount of times that’s happened. Long ago I started telling people to call me Noah!

Well, despite the turmoil of the day it was a good day. Busy at work and the carpooling for day one went very well. I was way early but that was because I feared black ice on the highway. Fortunately it was dry as a bone.

And now to call my friend who had her first day at her new job! I hope it was a good day for her too!

Springtime Where are You?

It will be Easter Sunday a week from today and I just wonder where the tulips are? As a child living in Ontario I always remember us in dresses and bare arms during Easter break. Here in Southern Alberta things are so unpredictable but I must say the last couple of years have been particularly horrendous when it comes to weather.

Alright, let’s take a page out of Mark Twain’s book and make that the last time today I talk about it!

When we were really little we would get an Easter Egg, the bunnies were too expensive for us to get. As we got older my mother would buy us a good chocolate bar instead of an egg because she didn’t like the taste of the chocolate (she thought it was cheap). Naturally we felt jipped. Sometimes we played games like following a row of jelly beans to find our treat, we’d each have our own colour to find. I remember one time it lead nowhere but at the end there was a pile of multicoloured jelly beans so I would have to search even harder. That was my dad, he was always rather tricky and liked to make good fun. Jeanette always used to freak out if he did a trick, she was not good at laughing at the joke.

I remember when they put on the different Easter stories. The Robe came on quite often and when we got a bit older BenHur would also be an Easter favourite. They really don’t make Easter stories the way they make Christmas stories. Why is that? I always get very choked up at the end of both The Robe and BenHur when the crucifixion happens. The story of Jesus’ sacrifice is poignant and powerful. It would be nice if a producer could write a story that is more up-to-date in connecting with people. What I mean is that the films are generally too filled with biblical phraseology and I would like to hear people speaking realistically as well as making the stories more in line with what really happened.

I was quite young when I started wondering what bunnies and eggs had to do with the Easter story so I must admit that I have never been super high on Easter as a “holiday”. Even though we were not a religious family I did feel that the crucifixion was a serious story. I was a strange child.

Today I just think of Easter as the usher of spring – and I would like to know why that isn’t happening right across this country? Jeanette said they have snow this morning too! What is going on with our weather? (oops, sorry Mark, but this writer cannot be true to her word!)

All My Children and One Life to Live

GOODBYE

PINEVALLEY, LLANVIEW

& DENISENS THEREOF

Yesterday was a very sad day for me as I was driving home from work. I heard on the radio that All My Children had been cancelled and later that evening I watched Entertainment Tonight and discovered that One Life to Live had also been cancelled. For those not in the know, these are 2 soap operas that have been on since the late 1960’s. I’ve watched OLTL since I was 16 years old. The way I got hooked on it was simply that I would watch the tale end of OLTL as I was waiting for Dark Shadows (a spooky soap) to come on during the summer holidays. There happened to be a storyline going on at that time where Viki Lord had developed a split personality as Nicki Smith and it was a fascinating concept for me.

I actually watched AMC without knowing it way back when it was first launch. The big love story was Phil and Tara, and Erika (Susan Lucci) was the little nymphette spoiling the love story! Back then there were clear cut heroines and villainesses after the same hunky guys. Now all we will be left with is Y&R and Victor Newman (I want to kill myself). LOL

It’s the end of an era in real soap operas, children of Agnes Nixon probably the greatest soap writer of all time. A really sad day. I am going to miss Tad, Erika, Jack and all the other children on that soap. As for OLTL I have never reconciled myself to Viki and Clint breaking up over that stupid Colonel nor changing Clint’s character to that of a bad guy. I always adored Dorian and David’s storylines, they were hilarious together. And my 4 favorite love stories on that show – Viki & Clint, Tina and Cord, Gabrielle and Max and then Max and Luna. I could never understand why the killed of Luna as she was a very unique character.

And that is why the soaps have been dying. They have changed the writers and producers so often, people who have not followed the stories and changed them up so badly that viewers have tuned out. OLTL had a great couple in Bo and Nora and then a producer came along who had worked with Nora on another show and decided her love interest on that show had to be moved over to OLTL. Killed that story to pieces and it took 10 years to get her back with Bo. And now they are shutting them down. As for AMC, when they killed off Dixie for good (she had been dead a couple of time already) they destroyed more viewership. Dixie and Tad were my all time favourite super couple.

There won’t be anything to watch in the afternoons when I am sick with a cold or flu. I won’t be watching a food show or a lifestyle show. Boring.

A sad day indeed.

Good bye Pine Valley and Llanview. I shall miss you!

TGIF

Have you noticed how many acronyms there are in your business world? I really hate them. It’s one thing to use them in technical terminology but when they are used even in the Human Resources department I just find it lazy and pretentious. I well remember walking into our company’s first HR session and the foreign manager kept using the term “KPI” which I had never heard before (as I am sure everyone else in the room had not either). I finally asked him what it meant since no one else was doing it. “Key Performance Indicator”. Hmmm, how hard is it to say that out loud instead of KPI. Lazy.

Things like that can really irritate me because I don’t see any reason to be stingy with one’s speech. If you want to use an acronym when you are repeatedly using it in a memo, that is all well and good if you define it the first time you use it. That’s standard practice. But one doesn’t do that in speech but instead assumes everyone knows what TFIM. Figure that one out folks.

When I watch movies from the ‘50’s and ‘60’s I notice how the women still wear hats and gloves and how everyone speaks graciously. I spoke about how cloddish people were on the C-train the other day but I can say the same for when people get on an elevator. Unless they are your friend, even though they know who you are and work with you, they don’t say good morning! Why is that? Has no one taught them any manners? I remember when I was a little girl my father taught me that one does not shout out a hello from the porch to someone walking on the street. The person “coming along” is the one who must initiate the greeting. So if one is sitting already in the bus, the person boarding the bus and walking down the aisle is the one who must first say hello. Those were things I learned before I was 10 years old. Apparently parents haven’t taught other people my age the same sort of manners or else they have just forgotten them.

Ah well, it’s Friday and I will be testing out my new parking spot today. Thankfully traffic is always lighter on Fridays. TGIF! J