Off the Clock

Well I was doing really good riding the bike to work almost every day, and even using it to run short errands. But I was realizing that the gears weren't shifting as well as they should, and before you know it I'd made some more excuses and went out and bought a NEW BIKE! Obsessive? Of course. Crazy? You have to ask? Sigh. So here it is; my new Trek Navigator. It was love at first sight. I've also given a lot of thought as to whether or not to wear a helmet. I prefer to ride without one, but I'm not the most coordinated at the best of times. I figure if I get slammed by a car a helmet isn't going to make a whole lot of difference, but if I just get knocked over or -- more likely -- fall over, it may save me from a more serious injury. Now if I could find one that's even remotely attractive I know I'd be more likely to actually wear it, and with that thought in mind I went surfing and bought this: Made by "Nutcase". Kind of seems appropr...

I've decided my bike needs a name. I've been developing quite a relationship with it, and it seems too impersonal to just call it "the bike". So I need some help. Any ideas? Maybe Gretchen? or Gloria? Something else? Why don't I give you some background. I used to have a really hard time bike riding because of my rheumatoid arthritis. It's mostly in my wrists, and the conventional way of bike riding where you are leaning on the handlebars just put too much pressure on them. It was too painful. So about ten years ago Canadian Tire came out with the retro cruiser-style bike and I bought one. The cruiser has you sitting more upright without putting all your weight on your hands and wrists. The handlebars are curved back towards you in a much more comfortable position (my wrists don't really bend) that regular straight bars. It only had six gears instead of the 21 that everyone else was riding, but I found the six plenty for the type of riding I d...

So you see what happens when I quit blogging? All of a sudden I want to blog! lol I'm addicted to my truck. Sad but true. While the rest of the country seems to be heading in droves to buy the latest in fuel efficiency, I've got absolutely no intention of giving up my Sport Trac. This truck was made for me. It's just the thing when I buy something fairly large and have to haul it home. Or when it's something dirty, like a load of compost, that you wouldn't want dumped in the back of a hatchback or the trunk of a car. I can toss bikes in there when one of the kids needs a ride home late at night. It's small enough to fit in my garage with all my other stuff in there. And, as of three weeks ago, it's all paid off. It's mine! Dennis DesRosiers, the negative auto analyst who's always putting down Windsor/unions/the domestic auto industry, has just written an article (below) about how we Windsorites love out "gas-guzzling" SUV's. ...

I suck at blogging. I was going really good for a few years, but I just can't seem to get to it these days. It's not that I don't think about it. Almost every day, certainly a few times a week, something happens that I think "I should blog about this". It's usually something small and boring, but interesting to me even if to no one else. However, I just can't seem to make the time to get to it. I have the same excuses as everyone else; school, work, family, blah blah blah. But the blog has become more of an albotross hanging over my head than the joy it once was. I have that sense of obligation to post and then the guilt when I don't. I find the guilt thing a little ironic since I've been working on a major mental cleanup to get rid of useless guilt. You know the type I mean, where we beat ourselves up over the simple mistakes we've made as we travel through life, or that our house isn't clean enough, or the weeds are overtaking th...

A new cat has adopted my Mom. Mom lives on a farm out in the country, so while I was growing up it wasn't uncommon to have abandoned animals show up. I'm not sure if Mr. Cat has been abandoned or not, he just started hanging around the house last summer. Now Mom doesn't want any new house cats at this time so she hasn't encouraged him to come in the house. Having said that he's super friendly, and she feeds him every day. He sits on the windowsill and looks inside. He's not even bothered at all by Max, Mom's brand new black lab (who will be the subject of another post). But he's not her cat. So she says. I think he actually has a circuit of houses he has adopted where he gets fed, particularly since she didn't see Mr. Cat much over the winter. We think someone else took him in. Anyway I met Mr. Cat for the first time the other day. I pulled into Mom's driveway when this black and white streak jumped off the porch, ran across the drivew...

I've been SO bad, going MIA for so long. I apologize. It's been nothing huge, just the usual overload; family, school, work, travel, house, blah blah blah. Then I'm not very good (read not good at all) about telling anyone that I'm taking a hiatus. Even an explanation seemed overwhelming at the time! Taking three courses at once was probably not the best idea last term, and as always seems to happen everything else seems to erupt at the same time. Then once you get away from blogging it's so hard to get back to it. However, I have a new project on the go that I will share once I take some pics. I also spent a week in the Dominican a couple of weeks ago where my niece got married, so I'll have to upload some pics about that. In my usual feast or famine fashion I'll probably post a gazillion times over the next week or two! But to get you started I'll just share a link to a little eye-candy, for anyone that isn't already familiar with brookly...

One of the most adorable things in my life is Tabitha curled up in a ball in her kitty-bed in front of the warm heating vent. Of course every time I try to take a pic of this she lifts her head no matter how quietly I try to sneak up on her. Usually I get something like this: or this: As I keep trying it inevitably leads to this: But today I was FINALLY able to get this: Finally. Now I think I need to go vaccuum that kitty-bed.

DD and I went out and had a great time last night. We went to a "Pajama Party" fundraiser for the House of Sophrosyne, a women's addiction treatment centre, and let me tell you we had a blast! Anyone looking for ideas for an awesome fundraiser shoud take notes. It's a party for women only, and everyone wears their pajamas. You pay one price to get in ($50 in this case but I think they should be charging more) and you get to enjoy a whole host of donated services and food. Of course there's a d-jay keeping things hopping and a local radio personality mc's the event. DD and I took advantage of lots of the services including parafin wax treatments, manicures, pedicures, massages (twice each! lol), facials, and henna tattoos. There was also fortune telling and astrologers, hair styling, make-up artists, some body detoxing thing, and other stuff that I can't remember. Of course DD made sure we took advantage of the popcorn machine as well as the cotton ...

And that's all I have to say about that. :)

Yup; sad but true. This is the book she just bought me. You wouldn't think such a little book could be so much fun! Or cause so much trouble! On a related note I've just discovered Zappos {evil grin} On another related note, I just ran across this video clip about a woman who can't find shoes that fit. I must be getting old and sappy because this brought tears to my eyes!

My local union had a chili cookoff fundraiser last weekend. Now I don't generally make very good chili, but I felt that I should at least make an effort. This was my first year, but those that have done this before get right into it. This is my friend Cathy with her version of "colon cleanser". She definitely had the best display going on. I usually just buy one of those chili packages and add a pound of ground meat (beef or chicken), a can of beans and a can of tomatoes and call it a day. I decided to look online for some help to come up with something a little more imaginative. I went to allrecipes.com because I get a lot of recipes there, but when I did a search for chili what seemed like about a thousand recipes showed up. I looked through a few but I was baffled; I don't know what makes a good chili from a bad one. So I did the next logical thing; I sorted the recipes by review and just picked the one from the top of the sorted list with the best reviews. ...

When I was in the states visiting my brother last month I bought myself a new waffle iron. It was definitely an impulse buy. I already had one, but it was one of those small ones that makes two small square waffles. Frankly I'd never quite mastered it. I never seemed to pour the right amount of batter in, and more batter ended up on the counter than on the plate. Then there's the little matter of the clip that locks it closed that I later realized had been broken off right from when I bought it. So this is the new weapon. It beeps to let me know that it's at the right temperature. Then you fill it up with the little measuring cup that comes with it so that just the right amount of batter goes in. Then you close it, rotate it 180 degrees to lock it and distribute the batter evenly, and then wait for the beep to tell you that your waffle is done... to perfection! Just look at that ooey gooey golden goodness. I think I'm in love!

Yep. 'Cause that's the nickname Sawyer came up with for me on this page . Not that I know who Sawyer is. I don't watch Lost and have no interest in starting now, but it's always fun to get a cool new nickname, I'm thinkin'. So in response to Bev's question on the last post, I don't think the suspenders in the last post are so much a Canadian thing as I think they are a 1994 thing. Or maybe a Vogue Knitting thing. Vogue does come out with some really odd things sometimes. Actually I think they were looking for some type of a retro highland look with the hat and all. But I do love that vest. More bad news on the job front. We're losing ANOTHER plant . The news came out yesterday morning. It will mean another 500 or so jobs gone (plus another 100 or so salaried), so we will now be down to about 2,000 workers when we were at almost 6,500 maybe five years ago or so. It won't affect me personally yet (and yet is likely the key word here) but...

I thought I'd found a project to use up some of the huge stash of sport weight wool cluttering up my house. The gauge on the wool and recommended needles are just about what this pattern calls for. I've been hanging on to this pattern for years; it's from the 1994 Vogue Knitting that I had a subscription to way back then. I've always loved it. Sounds perfect, right? Well, problem is that even though it calls for 3 1/2mm needles, I have to use 2 1/2mm to get gauge. I seem to run into this problem a lot. I don't feel that my knitting is loose but I always have to go down several sizes in order to get gauge. Now I have a hard enough time getting through a pair of socks on teeny tiny needles. I can't imagine an entire vest. The other thing holding me back is I've run into problems whenever I've tried using Vogue patterns. So if I do decide to go for it I'll have to make sure I give the pattern a really good once-over first. On the other hand ...

Here's Journey , my brother's puppy, with her buddy George. Now tell the truth; your day just got a little better, didn't it?

I finished up Branching Out. I even updated the progress bar on the side. Now I've started a basic rolled brim hat to go with it. I have two more balls of this yarn left over so I figured I might as well use it up. Not that I have a lot of time for knitting, school is definitely taking over my life these days. I don't know what I was thinking signing up for three courses. But I'm having fun with it, and that's what matters. This is the kitty-bed that I bought awhile back for Tabitha. She explored it a little when I first brought it home but now she just ignores it. I took the cushion out of the top basket and put it in her favourite hot-spot , she's happy with that. So today I decided to fill the empty basket with all my sock yarn. That way it can inspire me to come up with ideas for new socks while I'm busy time-wasting here on the computer. Most of it is Briggs & Little sportweight 1 ply wool that I mail ordered from New Brunswick. I love the ...

I've been fighting this cough that's going around. If anyone tells me how good my cough is sounding, I'll tell them good; I've been practicing all night! It could be a whole lot worse, and probably would be if I didn't get the flu shot. I was desperately in need of a little TLC today, and that includes comfort food. So after I dragged myself out of bed at NOON (now you know I'm not feeling well; I never sleep in like that!) I hit the stove. I have to tell you this has got to be the best beef stew I've ever made. I think one of the problems I often have is I try to make a huge batch and then it doesn't get mixed enough or catches bottom or is out of proportion or something. This small batch turned out just right. Of course I made it up as I went, so I'm going to write it down here in case I try to remember how I made it one day down the road. I made it from things I had on hand, but if I were shopping for it I'd add some fresh button mush...

As always it's feast or famine around here. A gazillion posts at once and then nothing for over two weeks. I've managed to get through another set of holidays, even if "Catzilla" decided to crush the villagers like in a "B" list horror movie! And look what she did to it! It looks like the village snow has now melted just like the real-life stuff outside in the balmy spring weather we're experiencing. We actually set a new record of 62F yesterday, when we are usually well below freezing at this time of year. While most people are thrilled with the break in the weather, DH is sulking. No snowmobiling, and even the base is gone, which means we'll need several good dumpings of snow before he (we) can get out riding again. So what else? I've been completely obsessed with my latest DVDs. DH got me the latest (and last) season of Gilmore Girls as well as Little Mosque on the Prairie . I love those shows! I'm also working my way through the latest...