Travel between Ontario and Nova Scotia can be tricky in winter – at least for us

So last time we travelled to Ontario in the winter, we spent Christmas in a small motel in Quebec with a broken truck and we had to eat Leonard.

Fast forward 4 years, and Jeff found himself working in Burlington last week for work.

He tried to come home on Friday, and the plane got all the way to the Bay of Fundy, but there was too much snow on the Halifax runway, so the plane turned around and took him all the way back to Toronto!

WestJet put him up in a hotel, but they lost his luggage, so he had no clothes, no toothbrush, and nothing to do.

They weren’t able to get him on another flight until Saturday at 5:30pm!

Luckily he made it to Halifax this time, and his luggage was waiting for him at the airport.

He sure was happy to be home!

I FOUND JEFF’S HAT!!

Jeff’s infamous Canadiens cap was missing throughout the playoffs, missing from Jeff’s head, missing from all of our photos….

HAS NOW BEEN FOUND!!

We had scoured this house for days during the NHL playoffs to find the hat.

Jeff even moved on and bought another, although it paled in comparison to the glory of its predecessor.

Want to know where it was?

I found it behind my laser printer!

Jeff and his hat

Herbes de provence in the kitchen

I’m having a great week. Highlights:

  • I went over to PEI for the weekend to hang with Grandma Stock and Uncle Joe. Had a great time. Grandma and I hit the shops in downtown Charlottetown.
  • Jeff painted the kitchen ceiling a couple of times while I was gone. Yahoo! Because I have been totally stressed out about painting the kitchen – all those awful edges
  • the last 2 nights we’ve done 2 coats of wall paint. At first we were seriously in doubt about the colour, and Jeff might still be but he’s staying quiet, but I LOOOVE the colour we picked (herbes de provence)
  • our edges aren’t perfect, but I didn’t stress
  • This Benjamin Moore paint is really nice. It doesn’t splatter and it doesn’t stink. The ceiling paint stunk up the house for days. Well it wasn’t really ceiling paint, because my father, once farmer – now painter, said to use a flat white wall paint instead. I told that to the lady at the paint store and she said, “You know what? All the painters who come in here say the same thing.”
  • I’ve been working my tail off – both at my day job, and after hours for my business. I picked up another web design contract from my favourite client

88| How did it get to be 10:45pm already. Gotta go fall asleep now. More updates later.

Saturday evening’s random updates

I’m sure Jeff won’t mind if you use this one

A week ago we had a visit from two insurance salesman. I am a new union member in my workplace, and along with the membership to the union, every member is offered a $4,000 insurance policy for free. I filled in my details to accept the plan. Of course I expected a call or a visit from that company – the company I had never heard of. Well they called me to let us know they were going to be in the neighbourhood and wanted a time to stop by. I reluctantly agreed. After all, if I croak suddenly, the least I could do is leave my husband $4,000 at no cost.

Well after we had the appointment for them to stop by, I googled the company’s name to see the word SCAM scattered all over the search results. It seems this company is more like an Amway or a Primerica company that depends upon recruiting the young and the desperate, works them hard, promises them big numbers, but pays them little.

We spent all day in dread for this appointment and tried to think of ways to get them out of our house if they turned up the pressure too much.

In the end, they turned out to be two nice young guys – one was desperately shy, and the other was the pitch man. He worked his way through his memorized script, and we were jumping right through his hoops, until he asked:

Him: “Sir, what will you do if your wife dies?”

Jeff: “Well it doesn’t much matter because I’d be in jail.”

Ha!! That one wasn’t in his script. Next question. :D :D

Gardening

I’ve decided that there are really only two good times to garden.

  1. When it is windy and the temperature is below 8°C
  2. February.

Those are really the only black-fly-free windows. In February we usually get a nice thaw here and the gardens are exposed. That is really when I need to clean out the flower gardens, weed, and add mulch. Today was luckily so windy and frigid that there was only one black fly that was alert enough to bite me.

Survivor – Heros vs. Villains

Best season since the first one. Go Russell!!

Kitchen Colours

I think we’re really close to settling on a new paint colour for our kitchen, and the hallway. AND we’re really close to picking out the formica pattern for a new counter top! Why do I say “really close”? Well because I’ve already decided what I want and now I have to wait for Jeff to make a really good argument for another colour and pattern, or cave to my suggestions. :yes:

Although in the end it doesn’t much matter what I choose because I am dreading painting the hallway and the kitchen more than anything else and think I might before just to leave it the INSANELY ugly colour it is now. I’ve painted big rooms, bathrooms, inside kitchen cupboards, heck I even painted a big picnic shelter in a provincial park, but the thought of painting around all the edges of the trim in the hallway and kitchen around all the cupboards puts me in a PANIC. I want perfect edges. I don’t want wall paint smears on the ceiling. I hate seeing my mistakes. I hate that my leather recliner has ponytail brown paint on it because I had paint all over my leg and sat in my chair. :no: Maybe I should practice somewhere else first. Like in some one else’s house.

Jeff’s Canadien’s Hat

I have no idea where Jeff’s cap is, but he’s so frustrated that he can’t find it. That hat drew so many comments from strangers. People would always come up to him and comment on his favourite hockey team. But about two weeks ago it mysteriously disappeared. I’d suspect someone was up to some hijinks by hiding it until the playoffs were over, but unless one of you secretly drove over from Ontario to do that, we don’t have any friends here that are up to the pulling-pranks level yet.

We’ve torn apart the house and looked through everything, everywhere, at least four times. And his truck. And the car. Jeff’s even looked in the shed. And I even stopped at the Chinese food restaurant we ate dinner at a couple weeks ago in case he had it with him that day and took if off to eat.

No sign. No clue.

Just the painful frustration of not knowing where it is, where it could be, or how the Habs aren’t being jinxed by a loss of this magnitude.

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The things I do to my husband

Imagine this strong, tough-guy, husband of mine, the man who was a self-sworn bachelor for life, the man who now has to deal with a woman’s irrational, tearful, crazy moments.

I had one of these an hour ago, and he is so sweet and comforting, even if he laughs the entire time, until I’m laughing and sobbing at the same time, and when that happens I can’t breathe.

What kicked off this sobfest?

My car. I’ve been without it three days this week and it has been a big pain in the ass getting the dealership to pick me up and drop me off and Jeff to take me to work, and when I finally get it back they tell me a squirrel has been living in the back seat, and I drive off to find out my Sirius satellite radio is >:XX’d up and I can only get 4 stations – top 20 hits on channel 1, the Catholic station, hard core sports, and a country music channel.

Oh yes, and my shoes.

I had shoes that I loved before, Doc Martens, but Surf ate them (that dog had such an appetite for leather… and glass.. metal… batteries… cd’s.. sewing needles..) Anyway, Jeff finally convinced me last Thanksgiving it was okay to spend money on a new pair. This week I was walking across campus in the rain, euphoric that my feet have been doing so well and it is spring and I love to walk and I was so fortunate to have such a comfortable pair of shoes, when suddenly I realized my right foot was soaked. How could my leather boot leak so fast? They are perfectly worked in, but maybe I need to give them a protectant spray again? I came home that night and asked my hero husband to take a look and he quickly found the problem. The rubber sole is cracked completely open across the ball of my foot and the Google is telling me that because I’m outside of the UK and because they are air soles, and because I don’t have the receipt, that they are not repairable. I’m crushed.

So it seems if you make it rain, and you take away my Doc Martens and my Howard Stern, it means I sob uncontrollably.

Sorry Jeff. I know the vows should have more been more specific.

Jeff caught a fish on his birthday!

Yesterday we went out on the boat in the late afternoon hours. It was Jeff’s birthday and the weather was unbelievable!

Here are some photos:

Here you go Brian, here is our house from the lake:

Jeff's Birthday

Here is Jeff setting up his fish finder:

Jeff's Birthday

Here is the first fish of the season! We both got little nibbles on our line at the same time, but only Jeff was the successful fisherman!!
(No Brian, we didn’t BBQ him, Jeff tossed him back)

Jeff's Birthday

Short sleeves on the water on April 3rd!!

Jeff's Birthday

Time to head home. Here is Jeff pulling up the anchor.

Jeff's Birthday

While I took photos of myself.

Jeff's Birthday

Oh my! Look what he caught!

Jeff's Birthday

Here is a neat old log cabin cottage on the only island in the lake.

Jeff's Birthday

We might need a dock soon. We put the boat in the lake about 3 kms down the road, and the good fishing spot is a km or so in the other direction of our house. The little 8hp motor we have means we have some travel time, but that is okay :D

Jeff's Birthday

The is our wireless internet tower just around the curve from our house.

Jeff's Birthday

Awwww life is good.

Jeff's Birthday

And I’m recovering from an ear infection so I put on a head set while we screamed travelled down the lake to keep the wind out of my ears.

Jeff's Birthday

It’s a big day… we said good-bye… and bought another!

Today Jeff said good-bye to an old friend.

We knew this day was coming, and we put it off, patched it up best we could, but today was the day Jeff’s BBQ took its final voyage to the big dump in the sky… er…I mean… the big dump down the road and around the corner.

We couldn’t find Jeff a new friend in Antigonish, so we took a sunny drive over to New Glasgow and found a much bigger selection in their Canadian Tire.

I knew the second I saw it in the line-up that it was the one.  I think Jeff knew too.

He was giddy like a school girl.  He met the rest of the BBQs in the line, but there just was no comparison.  With a twinkle in his eye, he set off to find a new BBQ brush to keep his new friend clean.  He picked up a normal sized one, and a humungous one and walked back towards me to ask my opinion.  A man walking by beat me to it and said, “the big one”, so the big brush it was!

Now he just needed a couple of employees to get the big box through the check-out and into the truck!

Once we got back home, it was immediately time for assembly.  And I knew I had better document their first day together.

Time to cut it open!

Ahh good the directions…

I wonder how long this will take.  Starting NOW.


Okay, step one…

Whoa, look at this step!!  Two will have to do!

Wasn’t too heavy, but I’m glad this top part came as one piece.

How are we doing for time?

Uh oh, missing parts!  Better check the box – oh there they are!

What size washer? Do I use a nut for this one? Lisa. Stop taking pictures, hold this, read me what’s next.

Okay, now the electronic box. Hey this BBQ requires a AA battery!

Time check…

Look at the mess involved! To think the store will assemble for just $40.

Time for the doors! And the propane tank!

And now it can be rolled into place!

All done!   Jeff and his newest friend.

(Time Check)

Beauty!

Now it’s time to season the grill!  These ones are a ceramic coated cast iron so they had to be washed with soap and water, dried, then rubbed with vegetable shortening.  Then they cooked in the oven for 20 minutes on 275°F. After they cooled, we were ready to go!

New BBQ Day

Check out the size of the new brush!!

New BBQ Day

Checking the potatos.

New BBQ Day

Even a side burner for the green beans!

New BBQ Day

If only you could have tasted it.  Mmmm mmmm good.

This new friend of Jeff’s cooks a little differently.  There are shields over the 3 burners so the flame will never touch your cooking food.  It took longer to cook, but the steak was done really well – not that Jeff has EVER made anything bad on a BBQ!

I love the Winter Olympics!

I love the Winter Olympics! I’ve been watching nothing but since it started (oh wait, I did turn the channel for Survivor!)

I like most events.  My least favourite is probably men’s hockey and curling. Everything else gets me on the edge of my seat (or couch).

It is depressing when the ridiculous commentators make it sound like the athletes failed their country when they get a 4th or 5th or even 12th.  I’m proud of everyone competing!

Jeff’s been sick since Thursday night.  I think it’s the Norwalk virus and you don’t want details.  His fever left last night but he’s still not cured. Luckily I haven’t caught it!

I stayed home from work on Friday with him.  It seemed to be a flu and he had a wicked fever so I didn’t want to risk spreading it at work.  (My coworker that I share an office with has two young children, and I think everyone is still H1N1 phobic.)

So this weekend has been another low key, Olympics on all day, weekend.

Tomorrow after work I’m heading to a forestry conference in Truro for a couple of nights.

Jeff’s sacred hunting grounds

Last year for Jeff’s birthday, I bought him a trail cam. It is a camo digital camera with a picture card and a battery that you strap to a tree. It has a sensor that will trigger the camera to take a photo if an animal walks by the camera. It even has an infra-red flash so it can take photos in the dark without spooking the animals. On the bottom of each photo it records the time, the temperature, and the moon phase!

Jeff put it up where he hunts deer so he can see what deer are around, if any, and what times they are around. He put a pile of corn and apples to attract the deer.

Here are some of my favourite photos:

deer

deer

deer

deer

deer

deer

deer

deer

There are **FIVE** deer in the one above. Can you see them all?

deer