That's the best you can do?

So government isn't supposed to destroy records without following correct procedure. But of course they do and we hear all sorts of reasons why. Today's favourite from what I've been reviewing?

"Those records were accidentally destroyed by a former employee who mistook the shredder for the photocopier".

Misplaced Lust.

There is a commercial that many of you have likely seen. It is for some skin lotion or something. Anyway, there is a woman on a bed reading or something and this shirtless guy comes in and they start wrestling. The whole point, of course, being that if you use their lotion you too can wrestle comfortably with half dressed people. Or person.

The first time I saw this commercial, I sighed in envy- out loud! . A. turns to me and says : MOM!!
Assuming, of course that I am lusting after said shirtless guy. In reality, though this is what I was thinking:
"Wow. That's a really clean bedroom. Spotless and perfect. Sigh".

I need someone to explain me to me. Please?

Occasionally - ok, more often than I'd care to admit - I will shuffle through the various post-it notes on my desk/in my purse/stuffed into pockets (my own) trying to get things done and I'll come across some cryptic note I wrote myself that no longer makes sense. Or enough to do something constructive. Today though...today I am totally baffled. I have a bright green post-it (the colour may or may not be relevant) that says "Monkey".

That's it. Nothing else. No quotes, no time or location (am I expecting a monkey from somewhere?) nada. What did I mean? More importantly, what happens when I don't do whatever it is that I was supposed to do? Is there a monkey somewhere waiting for a call, a ride a meal? Help!

Grace Kelly

Apparently, twirling in happy circles mid-walk just because the day is sunny and the music is twirly is not the done thing.

My ass is glass, baby.

Nope, I'm not confused. That sentence is correct. Or almost. I guess my ass has glass would be the exact phrase. What's going on? Let's take a little jump in time, shall we?

Last weekend was very busy. Gaming at the house on Saturday, then again at the library on Sunday. The boy had a cold all weekend long, a cold that he'd had for days. So not much sleep for him or me on Friday (too much coughing), and still baking at 3:30 AM, thanks to one mixer being broken. My Saturday normally starts at 4:30 and will again when everything is fixed. So I was tired, boy was tired and by Sunday supper we were all tired. So tired that although I heard the girl say that she had broken a glass in the bathtub but cleaned it all up, it didn't really register.

Showers were taken on Monday so really, any lingering bits of glass should have been long gone. And they were. All but the one bit that I sat on when I tried to have what was meant to be a relaxing bath after a difficult day.

All I have to say is that I occasionally dislike being single. And trying to tweezer a piece of glass out of my own heinie was one of those occasions. Monday sucked, but I have serious hopes that today will be better.

No, I don't want computer help.

I am having a hard time making really big cookies bake properly. Quite often they are over-cooked on the edges, and almost raw in the middle. I've changed the temperature of the oven, changed the level I put the rack on, tried making the cookies thinner/thicker....no unqualified success yet.


And where do we all head for tech help? Google, of course. Except there are computer cookies and cookie-cookies. And I don't have problems with computer cookies. Although apparently lots of people do, because there are a bazillion sites for help with those whose large cookies are making things crash. My cookies have never made me crash. Ever.

Back to the drawing board. Just felt like ranting. Who came up with computer cookies anyway? Why not make up a completely different word? Zooglies, or something. Messages that saw your zooglies are not enabled makes as much sense as cookies not being enabled. Ok, I'm done now. Honest.

Oh Mayb forgive me.

I...I'm a happy person. I know that the cranky people of this world (and no, I don't mean Mayb) look at us happy folk with suspicion and resentment*, but one can't change one's basic nature. I do, however, occasionally think how irritated some people might be when I am in a really REALLY happy frame of mind, particularly if there is no specific reason for said happiness. Because perhaps some things are beyond the pale.

So...Mayb, Jason and whoever else may read this blog I'm sorry. But this morning I was in the stacks singing out loud...to Aqua. Happy Boys and Happy Girls. Can we still be friends?

*I think because they don't believe that people can actually be happy and they're convinced that we're pretending to be happy while we secretly plot to rule the world.

Matchmaker?

It's good to try new things, yes? So I thought I'd give a shot at matchmaking. And where do I start? Trying to get a person who won't meet without emailing together with someone who won't email without meeting. Not my fault but I think the message here is that I'm not a matchmaker. I mean really, I should have started with something easier. Like some couple that's already together.

Rock a bye baby

I confess, I am a softy in the mornings. I make the lunches and if I think the day is going to be particularly hard for my babies (yes, they're teenagers but they're MY babies, so shut up) I will make them something special for breakfast. I made green pancakes this morning. What better use for the green sugar left over from the cookies we made for a bake sale? Anyway...

The boy thinks that his day has been starting earlier than it needs to. So rather than wake him up so that he is actually eating before I left for work today, I woke him up as I was leaving. Told him there were pancakes in the warming drawer, syrup in the fridge and he would have 35 minutes before I came back to take him to school. So did it work? Did he get ready in time?

Yes, but only because today I took the girl and her poster board and baking and things to her school before I came back for him. He got ready in the intervening minutes, pancakes uneaten. I knew, however, that he wouldn't be ready when I got there for the girl. How? When I phoned to say I was on my way, at the end of the conversation I said good-bye. He said good night.

And I thought I sucked at selling

I just finished a computer class. More than half of it was spent on what the software can't do. Why I need to spend time learning what I can't ever use is beyond me. Maybe that's why they're management and I'm a mere underling.

No knives this trip

So tomorrow morning I'm off on vacation, leaving boyo to house sit. Will he be watching the pets, or will they be watching him? Hard to say.

You'd think that I'd be more or less ready, right? I mean, I'm leaving in the morning after taking boys to school. And after assembling a three layer marble cake. And after delivering said cake. I'm not ready though. You're shocked, right? That I'm behind?

Not totally behind - I've borrowed two really big suitcases. Just don't know what I'm putting in them. I've mainly done the laundry, though, so I should be able to find something. This isn't a "I-hate-to-travel bit of procrastination. It's a cookie procrastination with a dollop of I-can't-believe-I'm-going poor planning. See, I'm bringing cookies. Which I haven't made. And I keep thinking of different types to bring. I also think I could make the dough for a pie in the morning and pack it and frozen Saskatoon's in my luggage so I can make a pie when I get there. I was even thinking of making bread in the morning (because what else have I got to do other than lunches, breakfast, packing, driving and cake making?) and bringing it as a carry-on. Because it is sort of a long term thing (I'd be starting it tonight) and I really didn't want to spend a day of my vacation hanging out in the kitchen. And I also really wanted them to try it. Howsoever:
a co-worker suggested that having freshly baked bread on a flight where the only food is either two dry cookies or a sack of some strangely shaped crackers would be akin to torture. I could auction it off, though, when everyone is suitably ravenous, thereby providing myself with a little more vacation moolah. I think she may be right, so we'll see about the bread. Maybe bread is even on the new list of things you can't bring on a plane. Who knows? What about sourdough starter? If it is liquid, does that mean I can't bring it? What if it is like thickish cake batter, can I bring it then?

I'm not completely unready. I have a list of things to do today, like get to the bank (I forgot to initial something when I got the loan) before it closes and get to the deli (I've ordered six really wonderful sandwiches for my baby to have while I'm gone) before it closes. And maybe the grocery store so I can get maple syrup for maple cookies. Which I'd have to make tonight, of course. 'Cept I'll have to pack at some point. Oh and money so my boy can't go on his date with three women while I'm gone. Aren't I the most permissive parent?

Also on the list, in giant letters - and circled in pink highlighter - is the phrase "Take the knife out of your purse!!. Because I don't think I have it in me to repeat the previous knife-at-security trauma. I just want the vacation, short though it is.

Lower than a Snake in a Wheel Rut

I'm not one for folksy sayings. Well, not often. And I would have told you that neither are my babies. I may not be able to say that any longer.

I talked to M., and asked her to check the San Francisco sour, to see if it was alive and well. She said it looked bubbly. Sadly, that wasn't good enough. I needed to know if it was truly alive and smelling like death. So I asked her to smell it. Yes, I'm a mean mom. Ask May-B., I'm pretty sure I can't get in trouble over getting a child to sniff a sour dough starter. Anyway, she did, and I asked did it smell? Her answer?

"Yes. Like a donkey in August".

How many?

You know what is very difficult? Not reciting "Peter Piper Picked a Peck of Pickled Peppers" when you're making a grocery list that has pickled peppers as one of the items on it.

happyhappyhappy

I have a new oven. New new new! I don't think I could be any happier. Ok, yes, if I had a new oven, a million dollars in the bank, a new body (or even just the one I had years ago back) and a vacation with Naveen Andrews starting tomorrow I would be even happier. However... the point is that the new oven has made me incredibly happy. I hope that there are things that can make you happy too. Things in the realm of possibilities, that is. Now if I can just stay at work until it's time to go home and not use up precious time-in-lieu! Work can be ok but when there is a whole new world of baking out there waiting for me staying here is very difficult indeed.

And for an encore, alien kidnapping and flaming death

So, in the past little while, I have had:
My large (and new and HUGELY expensive) Kitchen Aid mixer break (not yet fixed)
My furnace die (now fixed)
My car die (now fixed)
My oven die (will have to replace. So off to the bank)
My Ipod returned from it's loan to my son only to be run over (by me. And my girl and a friend replaced it. So I'm going to have to find the $ to pay my baby back)
No kids arrive for the roast beef/potatoes/gravy/veggie Sunday supper I prepared

The first thing happened a couple of weeks ago. The remaining FIVE happened in the space of a week. It was a very bad week. However...

As usually happens when disasters pile up, right at the point where by all rights I SHOULD be having a nervous breakdown, it all starts striking me as being funny. And then everything is alright again. So I think I'm back on track.

Words to Remember

A line I read today:
It's never too late to be what you were meant to be.

Making cold colder

So what makes Saskatchewan in February feel even colder than it already does? A dead furnace, that's what. That and the dreaded cold lump in the pit of your stomach as you contemplate what it might cost you in the end to get heat going in the house again.

You may be tired, but I could have died

So we do occasionally travel out of town on business in this department. Not often, but it happens. Which brings me to a tale that clearly exemplifies how much my supervisor believes that everything is about her:
Travelling in small town, staying in a motel. Some idiot throws a burning cigarette into a trash can. Fire ensues. Alarms in the middle of the night, trucks come in the end one room is moderately burnt and by the end of it all water logged.

I, in my own room, with the gift of sleep (merci, papa!) slept through the whole thing.

Over breakfast the next day, everyone talking about the fire my supervisor is angry - yes, angry! - at me because I got a good night's sleep whereas her beauty rest was broken and she never really got back to sleep after that. Hence her tiredness and really it was all so UNFAIR that I got a good nights sleep.

She didn't see anything wrong with the fact that standing in the parking lot of small town hotel it somehow never occurred to her to tell someone that I wasn't there. I did ask, she shrugged her shoulders. I guess she was too tired to think about her answer when people asked if anyone was missing anyone.

Think before you name

Working in government one tends to see a lot of groups, committees, etc. with unfortunate names. I'm sure you've all seen groups that could have had a better name, something that said what the group was all about, what its goals were, its mandate.

What group name made me think about this topic? I am working on records from the Thrust and Probe Committee. I don't know what they do. Something to do with teeth, I think. But that's not the point. The point is that this name should NEVER have been allowed. IMHO

How much in Doggy Years?

In people years it takes about three minutes (in the winter when there is snow to negotiate) to take garbage out to the garbage bin and then roll the bin to the street for pick up. How much time in doggy years? Long enough to eat a three pound fruitcake. Minus one tiny slice.

Yup, dad got his fruitcake, my sister and her husband got theirs, my customer's got theirs but mine...mine was pelicanned down by the dog (or possibly dogs, but I think the little one is innocent this time) when I took the garbage out on the morning of Christmas eve. So no comments from you lot should I decided to get rid of the dogs. Instead I will expect murmurs of kind understanding.