Thursday, April 28, 2011

Since my last computer crash....

I have decided that going back to good old pen and paper may not be such a bad idea. I have lost my files countless times now, and I am getting a bit weary of it all! So, my calendar has taken on new importance and pride of place in my office...there is a little more room now that the larger pc is gone! Now I just have to figure out the best way to keep track of financial records and bills in a simple way. Any ideas out there? Life would be so much simpler if we could just stash it all in our matresses! Fact is, that after you pay a bill, there is really no need to keep the paper. Of course anything that is tax related is necessary, so must be retained, but do I really need a fist full of paid Bay bills? Nope. My goal is to downsize my office to a single desk. I quite like the idea of downsizing before I have to.....it will make life so much easier both now, and once the time arrives to bid adieu to this house. You can never be too prepared - "pre" "pared"? Now that word makes sense, doesn't it?

Where has the week gone?

Any free time I have had, has been spent in my chair snoozing. Spring doesn't seem to invigorate me as it should. Must be all the dust that is being raised with all the crud in the air that did it to me in the fall!

This morning we had our usual breakfast, and supper was a Chinese Take Out. Not too inspiring, but hey, it filled a hole. I find it takes me a full week to recuperate from one trip, just in time to pack for another.

The mail was interesting today. This merino wool sweater coat would have been perfect for wearing in the chilly mountain evenings, with jeans, leggings or a skirt. Unfortunately, the red was "off", so I will have to ship it back tomorrow. Rats. But better gone than forgotten in the closet, never to be worn. The other package that arrived was from the E.L.F. people, with a number of goodies I purchased during the last sale!



I still can not believe that such good quality can be had for such a minimal price. This order contained THREE packages of makeup remover wipes, a stipple brush for blush that has two layers of bristles that are whisper gentle on the face, a mineral lipstick,a liquid lipstick and a gloss. The cost? $19.00 for the products and 8.00 for shipping. This is about the price that I was paying for a lipstick! If you haven't checked out this site, it may be a good time to do so, as there is a half price sale on for the next few hours. www.eyeslipsface.com

You definitely won't be sorry.

Wednesday, April 27, 2011

Cabbage is a good thing...

Especially when you stuff the leaves! The house is still fragrant from my efforts in the kitchen this morning, and there are a few tummy rumblings to remind me that indeed, we did eat well today!

At long last, I now have the ability to print from my laptop....

The PC is packed up in a box waiting for my son the genius to fix it, or declare it dead. The sound system is packed up and waiting for the UPS guy to come for it in the morning, compliments of the Samsung people. I absolutely hate it when mechanical things go wrong, and it seems so futile to even try fixing anything these days. Buying a new ' whatever' is usually cheaper and a lot less stressful than dealing with electronic carcasses. Ah well. So goes life. For those of you who like E.L.F. cosmetics, they have a sale on right now - 50% OFF their Studio and Mineral lines. This company makes fabulous cosmetics, and the regular price sets your eyeballs popping, let alone when they are giving you 50% off! If I hadn't tried this stuff, I would never believe you could buy mineral powder for three dollars, or a great mascara for the same! The shipping to Canada, of course, is 14.95, but I find it well worth my while to order. When you think that I spent thirty dollars for a compact that I now get for three? I look at everything else I receive as a bonus! I could go on and on about the product line, but suffice it to say, I am well pleased with the product, and find the quality to be equal to or better than what I have tried from companies that like to shift the decimal point on their prices to the far right!

Monday, April 25, 2011

ARRRRGGGGGHHHHH

I am beginning to question the value of electronics in my life. A little while ago, I got the dreaded blue screen of death from my PC. Tonight, as we were watching the tail end of Big Bang, the sound system gave out. So, after scouring the manual, we just unplugged the system and will pack it up tomorrow to send back to the company. Life was so much simpler when all you did at night was a bit of handwork or read, or remember the televisions that you had to actually get off your chair to change the channel? Of course, you didn't flip back and forth then, since there were only two available channels, and you could memorize the programing not to mention coordinate your social life and personal grooming by the theme songs. Every time I hear the theme song from Bonanza, I can smell Halo shampoo and feel the prickly rollers on my scalp. Right after Ed Sullivan, it was my turn to have my mother tightly wind those beggars into my hair to get some curl into it for the coming week. And yes. I did say week. For some reason? We just didn't get dirty hair back then, even if we only shampooed once a week. I never really agreed with calling them "the good old days" because frankly they weren't that good. People died from what is easily cured now.It took forever to get a letter from my pen pal in Japan. Women aged a lot sooner because Pond's cold cream and Dubarry lotion just didn't have what it takes to stave off the wrinkles. But? You didn't have the frustrations with things that you do now. Life was a bit slower, and a lot kinder. And when the TV didn't work? You kicked it and called a repairman!

Friday, April 22, 2011

Home but hiding.....

I just need to get my bearings here for a minute or two! We have been away from home far too long it seems. Today was rare, and absolutely lovely. Since it was a holiday, and we didn't arrive home until well after nine last night, we decided to sleep in. And what a perfect sleep-in it was! The rest of the day, I spent in the kitchen and horror of horrors, in front of the demon TELEVISION. I managed to find space to store the new pieces that arrived for my china. Not as hard as I thought it would be, since the pieces were duplicates (cream/sugar, ramekins, baker and pudding bowl,serving platter and vegetable bowl) that nicely tucked in along with their predecessors on the shelves. Our supper was baked chicken and rice with peas, which was, of course, presented on the new platter. The one sure way to get me interested in the kitchen is to give me a few new dishes or a new gadget!


It is so good to be home. The peace and quiet, the smell of a freshly bleached sink...could life get any better? LOL

Wednesday, April 13, 2011

Ahhh the breakfast of champions....

or should that be 'made by champions'? This morning, my dear husband made us our breakfast in our room, so I didn't have to stray far from my bed to seek nourishment! He is amazing at cooking in small spaces, which will prove very handy should Great Aund Aida die and leave us her boat! Till then, the man is formidable with an electric skillet and a twentyfour inch countertop! Breakfast was orange juice, two eggs, and two pieces of GF toast with butter. Followed by a snack of Bujah (GF party mix, basically, with an Indian flair - spicey but nicey) and a banana. Lunch will be much later in the afternoon, so best to calorie load at the bottom end of my day! Life is good at the Holiday Inn Express! It really is. The staff here is phenomenal, and the rooms are clean and simple, with all the necessities you need for a home away from home. In fact, it really does feel like home here, since we seem to be here for at least ten days out of every two months. Love the rewards program, too! Anyway, here we are, well fed and ready to read. I am on my second book since leaving home!

Monday, April 11, 2011

Woops!

The casserole turned out well! So well, in fact, that we ate it all up! LOL But it was good, and the mashed potato flakes made a great substitute for flour.

Monday

Instead of doing the laundry, I have been lured into my office. I am getting used to my laptop, and am so very grateful to have access to the rest of the world while my desktop is awaiting a diagnosis from my dear son. From the symptoms, he has feeling that my BIOS is gone with the wind! Speaking of wind, did I mention we went for Chinese food last night?lol

I have wanted an ipad for awhile now, but my hope was to replace my netbook an laptop with it, not the desktop! I miss the big screen and the keyboard, so I think I will try to find a new one asap!

So far today, I have managed to get the bedding changed, and the garbage gathered. The laundry awaits attention, but I will be picking away at the pile throughout the day.Since there were plenty of veggies in the frig that needed to be used up, I made a spinach vegetable casserole for lunch/supper. The original recipe came from a vegetarian cookbook from the seventies...Recipes for a Small Planet. Basically, you chop up veggies into small bites, anything works, really. Today, I used carrots, mushrooms, onion, green pepper, red pepper, yellow pepper, celery and of course the spinach. The best dish to use, is a caste iron skillet, but mine is too small. Anyway, you just dump the chopped veggies in with fresh spinach into a bowl, then mix a couple of eggs with some cottage cheese and shredded cheese ( I used Tex Mex Kraft today) and mix it all together. The final step is trying to fit it all into an oven proof casserole dish or the caste iron pan! It can be piled as high as you can pile it, as it shrinks in the oven. It takes about an hour at 350ยบ Since I can't thicken it with flour, I used some instant mashed potatoes. Hope that works! I also put a bit of Greek seasoning into the mix, with the salt and pepper. If it turns out, it will be delish, and I will post a picture!

Sunday, April 10, 2011

Busy Sunday

And it is just about over! Spent the day at the assembly, and the information was fabulously presented. We went to our local Chinese food place and enjoyed an excellent dinner with a good friend, lingering over our jasmine tea until we were able to roll ourselves out of the booth! MY oh my how I love Chinese food! Hot, spicy beef...mmmm good! We had hot and sour soup, curried chicken fried rice, almond chicken and Schezuan beef. Oh my goodness! What a lovely meal.

We are leaving a day early, so there will be little time to do laundry. Thought we weren't leaving until Wednesday, but nope. Off we go a the crack of dawn on Tuesday. I have lost all of my packing lists so I will have to either have to create a new set, or horror of horrors? Toss things in a bag and hope for the best! Think I had better go for the list making! It is so much easier putting it down on paper and getting the clutter out of my mind. I am beginning to see the value in going back to an old-fashioned method of keeping track of things. There have been one too many computer crashes in my life.

Saturday, April 9, 2011

Something to look forward to....

I couldn't resist ordering this Aran Craft sweater coat today.



After wearing this sweater with matching long scarf from the same company out on blustery days last week, I found it to be so comfortable and toasty warm, that I thought a similar garment would not be overkill. I also justified this extravagance because it is a completely different length, colour and is a little dressier. It will go with absolutely everything I own, so that made it a ringer! (Aren't I good at this justifying business?)

These garments are so well made that they are well worth the wait for them to arrive! It is quite the world we live in, when we can wear sweaters that came all the way from Ireland without ever having seen the place, isn't it?

Finding my feet....and computers turned ugly...

You would think things this size wouldn't get lost easily, but they sure have felt pretty wobbly for the last little while. With the coming of spring, things seem to be getting a little better. It seems to me that counting my blessings has become the activity of choice this past month. I fear that I am becoming a bit like Pollyanna in my dotage!

My weight loss has come to a grinding halt. I haven't really cared much about food lately, and I usually gain when I don't make food a priority. Of course, finding a great gluten free bread has not helped. While we were travelling in the US last month, we had sandwiches and sandwiches and more sandwiches! Such a treat after years of not having anything vaguely palatable for a sandwich. Gluten free bread is notorious for crumbling in your hand, and if you can get past the taste? You very likely can't get past the mess it makes! We had chicken sandwiches, egg sandwiches, cheese sandwiches....ah the glorious ease of eating protein between slices of bread...even quasi bread! On that note, I must confess that I am taking a lunch to the Assembly tomorrow I AM GOING TO PACK A SANDWICH! How much easier it will be to carry a little parcel in my purse, rather than a Tupperware container with various slippery and squishy things! Finding the joy in small pleasures of life is a privilege, I think.

Clothing issues have somewhat been resolved. I have pared down ten feet of double hung closet to about half that amount. While we were in Portland, I was able to buy organizers at Ikea - what clever people they are! I am very pleased with the outcome indeed. I kept my clothing purchases to the bare minimum. Two pairs of pants and a new basic black purse to be exact. Nothing exciting, but everything needed.

I have lost my big computer to the dreaded black screen...all the lovely pictures I have are gone. Not the personal ones, but rather the pictures of items I collected in my wardrobe, and my home. It makes you really question the value of keeping anything in cyberspace! I found all the pictures very handy when it came to creating packing lists for my trips. Now, I must go back to the drawing board and recreate basic lists of necessities that I can't leave home without. Or maybe not. Maybe it is better to random pack and hope for the best? Life is complicated enough. Ah the woes of computers turned ugly. Perhaps it would work to post them online, never to be lost? On that note, I offer you glimpse of my new bedding. CHAPS makes lovely things!