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Friday 29 December 2017

Donkey's Identity Crisis

Whew.

Christmas 2017 blew past like a . . . well, like a gale. Literally.

Santa brought quite a little storm on Christmas Day, with gusts of winds at hurricane force, and it left one-quarter of our province's homes without electricity. There have been many stories in the news of how people coped. Some used their barbecues to finish cooking their turkeys. One family used their large toaster oven, powered by a generator, to cook a large chicken.

What didn't make the news was how people without barbecues and generators managed, but I'm sure there were ruined meals in some homes. I count our family extremely lucky that we didn't lose our power, and everything went smoothly in the cooking department.

In fact, we had two Christmas dinners. Due to the storm, some of our company couldn't make it on December 25, so we had an instant replay the next day for them.

It was wonderful to see family and have a good visit with them. Our families are small but spread out, so we don't get together very often.

*****

I'm happy to report my poetry muse came right back as soon as the stress wore off. As I popped yet another Belgian chocolate in my mouth, these lines wandered in the front door of my mind and couldn't find their way back out, so I'm letting them make themselves at home on the good furniture (hahaha, when you have cats there isn't any good furniture) and stay awhile. Sing them to the tune of "Deck the Halls," my friends:

Eat the sweets with gay abandon
Fa la la la la, la la, la la
Eat 'til I'm no longer standing
Fa la la la la, la la, la la
Buy new pants; the old won't fit me
Fa la la, la la la, la, la, la
Heart attack is going to get me
Fa la la la la, la la, la, laaaaaaaaaaaa

*****

That is all for today. Except, we must have a picture. Possibly more than one.

I can't decide which of the following more precisely illustrates how I am feeling after all the food and treats.

This one?

Happy, happy hippo


Or this one?

Sleepy, sleepy sloth


Tomorrow we go out of town to visit our daughter and her family. So, despite wanting to just sit on the couch and read one of my new books, I'm off to do some more cooking and baking to take with us.


We will be seeing the Donkey Grandsons, ages three and one



I am starting to look forward to going back to work next week just to get some ding-dang rest.

But it's been worth the work. And now we gird ourselves for the two coldest months of the year here. We are off to a fantastic start; it was minus 15 Celsius today and minus 29 Celsius last night (with the wind chill factored in).

January, here we come.

Have a restful weekend, my bloggy friends. Do you have plans for New Year's Eve? I do. I'm going to get some sleep :)

One last picture. This is the real me. Not a hippo, not a sloth, just a donkey.

Donkey Selfie :)





Monday 25 December 2017

Friday 22 December 2017

Friday Funnies

Some random funnies for you on this Friday, because my brain is still on strike :)

Actually, this first one is not entirely random. I had an unscheduled nap when I was supposed to be writing this post.




Now for some randomness.























Overachiever dog















Why, yes, I did spend an awful lot of time looking at LOL pictures when I should have been doing something about being more ready for Christmas, but it was worth every second. My stress level went from danger level to ahhhhhhh . . .

Hope everyone has a happy weekend! Merry Christmas to all who celebrate on Monday. I'll be posting just a picture that day (so you'll not miss anything if you skip it), and I'll be back next Friday.

Cheers :)

(All LOLs by icanhas.cheezburger.com, with thanks.)

Monday 18 December 2017

Poetry Monday: A Christmas (Or Holiday) Memory . . . Another Fail

It's Poetry Monday, and this week's topic is "a Christmas (or holiday) memory."

Join Diane, Delores, Joan (in the comments here) and me as we give this theme our best. You can play along, too. Just leave your poem in the comments on any of our blogs or on your own blog; if it's on your own blog, don't forget to leave us your address so we can find you.

Last week I had trouble thinking of my "happiest family memory" and I ended up not writing anything.

This week, I wrote a poem but it ended up being serious and schmaltzy and self-centred and it was hard to have fun with it, which is my favourite thing to do when writing anything, and it also made me feel guilty that I have such positive experiences when countless others are starving, homeless, bereaved or seriously ill.

Instead you get some funny pictures. And hopefully come January I will be more inspired. Or I will decide to forego Poetry Monday. I'm not clear yet which it will be.

Funny pictures in 3 ... 2 ... 1 ...












Hope everyone has a good week!




Friday 15 December 2017

Oh Yeah, Baby. I've Had A Week.

This has been one of those weeks, or maybe two weeks, when Life just starts making a clunkety-clunk noise and what started out being a decent road trip grinds to a halt and there you are sitting on the side of the road while the big trucks whizz by and you're a little bit scared to get out of your smoking car in case you make things worse by getting run over.

At least I'm over my bitterness of last Friday's post on the #MeToo movement. Thank you all for your helpful comments. I am now seeing the movement as the first step in a full conversation that will probably go on for quite awhile and everyone will get a turn to speak and it will hopefully move us all ahead in our striving to be mature, good people.

And I was doing very well on my holiday shopping, until suddenly there were a few commitments on the calendar that mean I'm now about as far behind as usual. I refuse to panic, because panic makes me run around holding my head in both hands and speaking in partial sentences that never add up to a complete thought. Instead of panicking, I choose to impulse shop, because giving inappropriate gifts is better than giving nothing at all.

Or is it? Joey wrote a great post on inappropriate gifting, which is here. So far, I haven't acquired any of the items on that list, so I suppose that's something. Although, where DO you buy a dead plant?

Moving right along.

My back was pretty well back to normal after that flight I took, although my right hand was still giving me trouble. Did I mention I smashed two of my fingers in my trip down the stairs? (Probably. Sorry.) Once my back started improving, I went back to my regular schedule which includes my job (using my hand) and housework (which uses my hand) and cooking (which uses my hand) and so on and that was probably not smart because I'm pretty sure I sprained those fingers and the only cure for a sprain is to not use the joint until it stops hurting whenever you use it. According to internet sources. And I use only the best internet sources, so I'm sure it's true.

So I cut back on using that hand as much as I could and it started improving. Aha, I thought. Things are almost back on schedule for a merry Christmas.

And then, out of the wild blue yonder, my mom started having health difficulties again. She is currently in the hospital but doing much better. She had severe vertigo which was probably caused by her chronic ear and sinus issues, aggravated by failing to take a medication which she has deemed "not really necessary." In general, her cognitive and logic skills are failing, and she likes to be independent, so my help is generally not welcome, and every once in awhile we end up in a figurative smoking car by the side of the road, and it's my job to get things sorted out and get back on the road. While Mom sits in the car telling me the same stories over and over and wondering why the car isn't moving.


I do try to be patient. Sometimes it's really hard.


But it helps to talk about it. And try to laugh about it.




Late for everything . . . even sleep. Everything moves so slowly at the hospital, doesn't it? The night my mom went in, it took awhile to do some basic tests and determine that, yes, she would be staying there all night, so I didn't get home until 3 a.m.


And then there's also this, caused by lack of activity during back outage. And probably by eating to make the pain go away. All the pains.



But this is one of the better outcomes. (Did I steal this from one of you? I feel I may have. Well, that just shows how much I liked it when you posted it. Thank you for that.)

 

And this one is just because black cats are awesome. Black kittens may possibly be even MORE awesome, but it's a fleeting moment before they become big cats.


I hope everyone has a smoothly running, maintenance-free weekend. See you Monday. Unless I don't.



Monday 11 December 2017

Poetry Monday: Happiest Family Memory . . . Fail

It's Poetry Monday, which I can't quite wrap my head around, because we just did this a couple of days ago, didn't we?  Technically, it was seven days and I know that perfectly well, but it seems far less.

This week's suggested theme is "happiest family memory." I found this topic quite challenging and since it was a very full week in other ways, I am bowing out of the party for this one.

However, please feel free to use the comment section to leave your very own poem or to give me a tongue lashing for wussing out. You can also post your poem on your own blog; please leave a note in the comments so we can find you.

Remember, too, that Diane and Delores will have a freshly baked poem for you to digest; just click on their names to make your way to their blogs.


*****
And just so you don't feel it was a complete, total, absolute waste of finger power to click over here to my blog today, here is a consolation prize:


Home decorating kitties (courtesy of icanhas.cheezburger.com)

Have a good week and don't let your kitties (or doggies or hamsters or ferrets or ponies or lions or giraffes or elephants) help you with the furniture placement this holiday season.





Friday 8 December 2017

Sober Second Thought


I had a post all written about my reservations regarding the seeming excoriation of all the men on the planet by the #metoo movement, or perhaps it's just the "me too" bandwagon aspect of it that's making me crazy, but at the last minute I pulled the plug on it. I'm going to let it sit and see how I feel about it in a few days or a week.

How's that for dipping my toe in the water without committing to going swimming?

Let's just go with this for today instead.


Recklessly stolen from Facebook. I'm not insulting old people. I AM one.


Have a good weekend, folks.

Monday 4 December 2017

Poetry Monday: Shopping

It's Poetry Monday, and this week's topic is "shopping."

Join Diane, Delores, Joan (in the comments) and me as we dissect this subject and pound it into poetic shape, making it a beautiful thing. Or an interesting thing, at least. Why don't you write a little something, too? You can leave it in the comments at any of our blogs, or if you post it on your blog, write a note in the comments so we can follow the breadcrumbs back to your online home and cheer you on.

We celebrate a secular Christmas here, a chance to gather some of the family at the beginning of the long winter, enjoy a traditional meal, and exchange gifts. But whatever and however you celebrate, I'm pretty sure there's likely some shopping involved and you can probably relate to my poem this week.

For me, shopping at this time of year is sometimes a pleasure but more often it is filled with doubt, vacillation, second-guessing my choices, a sinking feeling, and sore feet. We have a relatively limited selection of stores in our area. I don't do online shopping because I want to see, touch, and even smell the stuff I buy. (If you've ever brought home "eau de rubber tire" shoes or "eau de mustiness" paper products, you'll understand why.) So it's not often possible to come up with a great idea and then shop for it. It's more a matter of checking out what our stores have and trying to match available merchandise with the people on our gift list. 


Please Just Shoot Me Now

Christmas is coming
In twenty-one days,
And I'm in the midst of
A gift-finding haze.

Every store in the mall
Is a feast for the eyes . . .
Every store in the mall
Is full of big lies.

They're all so inviting,
With colours and scents,
But I know I will NEVER
Find perfect presents.

I wander the aisles
In a path most erratic;
With eyes all glazed over,
I'm on Automatic.

I'm hot and I'm cranky
In these winter clothes;
My feet hurt, my back hurts,
And DRIP goes my nose.

I pick up a geegaw
And carry it around,
But I know before leaving
I'll have set it back down.

No one needs geegaws
Or whatsits or whosits
Or trinkets or baubles
Or whatchamacallits.

(They ESPECIALLY don't need
The whatchamacallits)

I pick up a toy
And carry it around,
But again before leaving
I put it back down.

Ditto for clothing,
And slippers, and books,
Jewellery, wallets, and
Everything That Cooks.

What's that I hear?
The stores are now closing?
I plod to the door,
My plans decomposing.

The List is no shorter,
My time runneth out . . .
I'll be back tomorrow --
Of that I've no doubt.

*****

Thanks, Pixabay, for the awesome picture of me.



*****



P. S.  Guess what? I did go back, the very next day, and, lo - I whacked my list nearly in half, in one go. Maybe all that "looking" paid off after all.

QUESTION:  How do you attack your "to buy for" list? Do you come up with ideas and then shop for them, or do you have to "take what you can get"?




Friday 1 December 2017

A Better Mousetrap

If you've been reading along the last few weeks, you'll know I fell on Halloween evening and hurt my back. It's feeling much better now and I can even put my socks and sneakers on without wincing. But that one-second slip has caused ripples in the pond of life that continue to spread outward and swamp the small and the innocent.

My car had to go to the garage this week to have snow tires put on and some regular maintenance done. When I picked it up, the service guy went over the items on the bill with me. The last charge was for replacement of the cabin filter, which is the air filter between the outside and the interior of the car. The mechanic had found and removed a nest from the blower motor.  A nest made by a rodent who was, fortunately or unfortunately (depending on who you are), dead when the mechanic found it.

All I could think was "poor little mouse." I wrote a couple of posts about mice in our house, HERE and HERE and even HERE, and the gist of those is that while I am not a mouse-lover (more of a mouse-liker, or a mouse-accepter, or maybe just a mouse-admirer-but-not-in-my-house-person) I hate the thought of causing any animal to suffer, no matter how small. I suspect the mouse set up housekeeping while my car sat unused in our lane during the time I couldn't drive, and I also suspect it died the first time I went for a drive after that hiatus.

In addition to the burden of death that is now on my hands, we paid just under a hundred bucks to have the little corpse and its home removed and a new, clean air filter installed.

And no, I didn't smell a thing.

*****

But now I'm super aware that another mouse could get in, and I spend most of the time I'm driving at night imagining that there is a mouse inside the car and that it is going to run up my pant leg.

The main reason I worry about that particular scenario is because of the story my father told me about his job working at a commercial hen house in the 1950s. As you can imagine, there was a constant rodent problem around the barn which housed thousands of chickens. My understanding is that they couldn't put out poison because the chickens would get at it. So rodent control consisted of a pitchfork and a person. A horrible thought, but it was a fact of life and part of my dad's job. One day as he was dispatching mice, one intrepid fellow ran up one of his pant legs, across, and down the other leg. My dad would always shiver when he told the story, even though he was half-laughing at the same time. (Not about the stabbity part, just the up-across-down part.)

I really, really hope I don't have a close encounter with a mouse in my car while I am driving.

*****

Have a good weekend, people. May you be mouse-free in both house and vehicle. And especially in person.


I hope this is what "my" mouse is doing now, in a different dimension . . .

(Picture: source unknown)





Monday 27 November 2017

Poetry Monday: People

The topic this Poetry Monday is "people" - join Diane, Delores, Joan (in the comments here) and me as we take on this wide-open-to-possibility theme. You can take part, too; leave a poem at any of our blogs or on your own. If you do the latter, please leave your blog address in the comments so we can come along and cheer you on.

Get comfortable, people, because we're going to take the long and winding road to this week's poem.

On Saturday afternoon I decided to head into the countryside to a craft sale I'd never been to before. I wasn't sure exactly where it was, but the community wasn't very big and it wasn't far from where I grew up so I figured I'd find it. But when I reached the hall where I thought it might be, there was no signage and only a couple of cars in the yard. I decided to check another venue on a side road in case the sale was actually there instead, but I still didn't see any signs and by that time I was well along the side road and there was a rather large truck on my back bumper, so I had to keep to the speed limit or risk being flattened and before I knew it I was way out in the country where I went to high school.

And since I was that far along, I thought I'd keep going out to the little community where I grew up. The route I followed was the same route I took home from school on the big yellow bus every day for six years, so as I drove I remembered all the kids who got let off along the way. Eventually I got as far as my old home and a bit further to the church where we were married and then I turned around and drove back to my current home by way of a different country route which we used to take to get to town every Saturday when I was growing up. And so I saw even more homes of more people I knew until I moved away as a university graduate on my own at last.

So I never did make it to the craft sale but that drive certainly stirred up a few memories for me. I recalled my best friend of many years, and realized I need to call her because it's been too long since we've gotten together. I was reminded of the older boy who spent his summers working on the farm across the road from us, and what a gentleman and a hard worker he was, with a great sense of humour. I remembered the poor family whose kids always seemed to be grimy-looking; their parents spent their money on cigarettes and booze and I always felt bad for the kids, but the daughter who was about my age was one of the kindest girls in school. There was the lady who played the organ in church every week; she played at our wedding, too. There was the church itself, the setting of many a potluck dinner and many a community concert, one of which included yours truly on the recorder, and one of which included my brother and three of his friends lip-synching to a Beatles hit, and all of which included fudge for sale at intermission and not a drop of water in the building. There was the empty lot of land where our telephone operator's little house used to stand; my mother gave her a home permanent every so often and the one time that I went with her, I was put in front of the old-timey plug-style switchboard, given a ten-second lesson on how to connect people if the phone rang, and remained sitting there, paralyzed with fear that it actually would ring. (It didn't.) I recalled the live-in housekeeper of the farmer one house down, who kindly welcomed us with cookies and milk, and often a shiny dime, when we knocked on her door, and who looked after my brother and me the time we had chickenpox and my mother was teaching. I remembered the retired nurse who lived two houses down, to whom my mother sent my brother when he stepped on a board with a nail in the end - it flipped up and the nail went into his forehead right above his eye. I saw the empty land where our two-room schoolhouse used to stand, and in my mind I saw the kids playing in the yard at recess.

And mostly I thought about my own family, and the house I grew up in. It was sold a few years after my dad's stroke. It wasn't in great condition to start with and with no one living in it, it was going downhill fast. He sold it to the first buyer who came along, who - as it turned out - didn't have the means to keep it up either. The house is empty now; the flower gardens my mother laboured over with love for years and years are now overrun with scrubby trees and long grass. The vegetable gardens my father put in every year and gave carloads of food from are long gone to grass as well. The garage where my father spent so much of his time tinkering and doing car repairs for the neighbours is falling in.

It was a melancholy way to spend a gray fall afternoon and I was glad to get back to my town and re-surface in the present. Nothing is the same as it was, and I'm not sure I'd even want that. But I wish I could step back in time just for a few minutes, and have the future spread out before me like the full blue sky on an early summer day, and a community of hard-working, kindly neighbours at my back.

After all that, we need a very short poem, don't we? Emphasis on "short."

My People

The people of my childhood
Are frozen in time in my mind
Like black and white photos--
Like a group school picture,
A community baby shower,
A card party,
A dance,
A Sunday school picnic at the park.
So many are gone now,
Living elsewhere,
Or no longer living.
But, always, they will remain
In a little flame of memory
Burning in my mind's eye.


*****

Thank you for reading. It was a long post, and I appreciate you hanging in there.

A community shower; I'm not sure if it was a baby shower or a bridal shower. It was my first; I was all of three months old. Can you find me? (That's a kindly neighbour who is holding me.) You can see part of an old-fashioned telephone at the top of the photo, just left of center. The baskets of gifts for the honoree of the shower can be seen on the floor. All the women wore dresses. And most of them wore high heels. I wore a diaper and a nightie. By the time I got old enough to be the guest of honour at a shower women were mostly wearing trousers. Way off topic, I know.


There I am!


Question:  What kind of community did you grow up in?





Friday 24 November 2017

Where In The World? . . . There's Probably More Than One Answer To That

I was all set to write about names of places around the world and about how many are familiar to me because we have the same ones here in Nova Scotia, Canada. For example, England and Nova Scotia both have places called Plymouth, Falmouth, Chester, Liverpool, Durham, and Truro. This is a novelty to me as I have not travelled much and never read a map for fun until Google Maps showed me a whole other side to seeing the world. Zoom in! Zoom out! Street view! Satellite view! The fun goes on and on.

And then along came a news story that just begged to be included in this post.

The story is about a man from Truro, England, who decided to drive around the world, ending in Truro, Nova Scotia. Benjy Davenport has been travelling for the past six years throughout Europe, Russia, Middle Asia, Canada, the United States, and Central America. It took him five years to plan the trip and work to raise enough money to get started and to convert a 1998 Land Rover so he could sleep and eat in it.

Davenport was born with Noonan syndrome, which is a genetic disorder preventing normal development in various parts of the body and causing a variety of problems such as unusual facial characteristics, short stature, and heart defects. He decided his trip would be to raise awareness of this disorder and also to show that you don't have to be perfect to pursue a dream.

Along the way, Davenport acquired a street dog named Jake, a Golden Retriever/Australian Shepherd mix who followed him around during his time in Guatemala. He found he just couldn't leave "such a well-mannered dog" behind, so he got him his shots and papers and now Jake is his travelling companion.

Davenport plans to be in Nova Scotia until the end of November, and would like to visit Sydney, NS, because he was born in Sydney, Australia. After that he will be taking at least a year off, but hopes to eventually go back on the road and explore South America.

For the full story, click here: Around the world from Truro to Truro. I've summarized most everything in the article for those who don't like to click on links, but there are a couple of pictures there of Davenport and Jake, and the full length article.

I thought this story was as compelling in its own way as last Friday's post on Mermen -  a good news story with a twist.

Got any good stories about duplicated (or triplicated) place names? Please share!

And have yourselves a good weekend. I think mine's going to be the best one this month (my fall was the last day of October), because I am moving so much better now. I'd been improving a little every day, but there seemed to be a breakthrough three weeks and one day after my injury. I suddenly noticed I was moving naturally again, without pain except for certain things like getting my left leg into the car when driving, or putting on my left sock. My hand, which I also hurt, is taking a bit longer, but even it was noticeably better the same day. Is three weeks some kind of magic recovery period? I'm not going to question it any further - I'll just enjoy it.


The earth seems to have shrunk since the internet came along, with its blogs and its maps and its instant everything. And I'm glad.


(Photo by Pixabay)


Monday 20 November 2017

Poetry Monday: Light

It's Poetry Monday, and the topic this week is "light."

Join Diane, Delores, Joan (in the comments here) and me as we try to shed some light on "light" . . . Read, critique, leave a poem in the comments or post one on your blog and tell us where to find you. It's all for fun so have a good time with it.

The only thing that came to my mind around the topic of light was the phrase "go toward the light" . . . and given the fall I had a few weeks ago, I wasn't exactly partial to writing about that. It feels like tempting Fate.

. . . Oh, what the heck, eh? Tempting, shmempting . . . Let's go there.



Missed By THAT Much

My foot did slip upon the stair;
My back did bear the consequence.
I'm paying still for that wild fall,
And here it is, near three weeks hence.

But Oh! My dears! It could be worse;
I could have hit elsewhere instead.
I could have ended in a hearse
If I had landed on my head.

So every day I tell myself:
While falling wasn't very bright,
At least I'm still alive to say
I did not go toward the light.

*****

Sorry to be going on and on about that fall, but maybe you'll forgive me if I tell you I spent hours trying to find inspiration, but when I thought of "light" in this way, the poem itself took ten minutes. Hah! Take that, Dylan Thomas!

(Please, Fate, don't be mad at me for using Dylan Thomas' name like that.)

And just to update you with actual facts about my back, I've been to my own GP and am scheduled for an x-ray tomorrow. My doctor is pretty sure I just have soft tissue damage, but he wants to set my mind at ease. I'm still having pain while sitting unless I'm leaning forward on my arms or elbows. Did I ever mention that my employment requires me to sit for prolonged periods without leaning forward on my arms or elbows? Well, it does. I see physio in my future.

Hope you have a good week, and if you see any bright lights . . . you know what to do.



It turns out that the light I saw was just the ceiling light fixture. No, this is not our fixture. But it's much more interesting than ours. (courtesy of Pixabay)




 

Friday 17 November 2017

Mermen

It's been another one of those weeks where things don't go as planned and there are too many nerve-wracking appointments (root canal finale, plus doctor appointment to follow up on my lingering back pain and numb foot, which by the way seems like it should be terribly serious but probably isn't, but I'm having an x-ray at some point to make sure) and it feels like walking through mud up to your knees and all of a sudden it's time to write a post and WHAT???

Well, this is what bookmarks are good for. And today the bookmarks tell me I must inform you about Mermen and a hilarious, catchy, warm-your-heart fundraising calendar being sold in the Canadian province of Newfoundland and Labrador.

Here's a picture of Newfoundland and Labrador (abbreviated as NL), in case you're "from away" (as they say in that province, meaning "someone who doesn't live there"):

Newfound and Labrador is outlined in red.


Okay, if I were to do this post the way it deserves to be done, it would take a lot of work. So I'm going to be lazy and just put in a link and a picture, because I am pooped. My apologies.

The link to an article on the Mermen and their fundraiser:  HERE

And a picture to whet your appetite for more:


Can you even stand how much fun that is?? (picture courtesy of The Daily Mail from the link above)


By the way, in case you're as pooped as I am and don't want to follow the link, the money raised from sales of the calendar is going to Spirit Horse NL, a project that uses horses to help young people, adults, families and other groups enhance their mental health and learn new skills.

And plans are already underway for next year's calendar, to benefit a different charity.

The world is full of wonderful people, innit?
* * * * *

Have a good weekend, all!

Question: Would YOU dress up in a mermaid/merman costume for a good cause? Have you ever done anything outrageous (even slightly) for a good cause of any kind? Spill the beans, people!





Monday 13 November 2017

Poetry Monday: Remembering

We are two days past the official date, but we at Poetry Monday could not let Remembrance Day get too far out of sight without proper recognition.

Don't forget to check out the offerings of Diane (On the Alberta/Montana Border), Delores (Mumblings), and Joan (in the comments on this blog). You can comment, critique, or leave your own poem at any of our blogs, or on your own blog (just make sure we know you've done so and we'll come along and read/encourage). Feel free to choose a different topic if you wish.

First, the background to Remembrance Day, which is familiar territory for many of you. In Canada, as in so many countries around the world, this day is observed on November 11 each year. This is the date on which the armistice which ended World War I was signed in 1918.  In Canada, it is meant as a day to remember the men and women who have served and who continue to serve our country during times of war, conflict and peace. This includes the First and Second World Wars, the Korean War, and all conflicts since then in which members of the Canadian Armed Forces have taken part.

Many Canadian families have lost dear ones, especially in the two world wars. While I had some relatives serving, none were lost. I have not suffered the deprivations of war; I have not ever been fearful for myself or anyone I am close to. So my only knowledge of war comes through reading, and I am often drawn to books about wartime. I marvel at the heroic and selfless behavior of not only the armed forces of land, sea, and air, but also of nurses and other medical personnel, of spys, of civilians caught in bombing raids in cities or displaced from the countryside during active engagement, of prisoners of war, of victims of concentration camps. I find myself wondering how I would behave under any of those circumstances.

War and its tentacles have caused enormous loss of life, not just in the military, but in general, and that deserves to be remembered at all times. Remembrance Day is set aside specifically to recognize those who put themselves on the front line, those who gave or are willing to give their own lives so that others may have a chance of peace, of freedom, of life itself. Where would our world be today without the members of the military who turned the tide in each of the world wars? That example alone is a very bleak thought. Those who serve today follow in the footsteps of soldiers before them, willing to risk everything to do the job they signed up for.

Back to the purpose of Poetry Monday. It's difficult to compete with the eloquence of John McCrae's "In Flanders Fields." It's hard to find something original to say. But it is not hard at all to feel gratitude and to write simply and from my heart.

We Remember

At the eleventh hour
Of the eleventh day
Of the eleventh month,
We remember.

In tiny towns,
In large cities,
In each of our hearts,
We remember.

Our army,
Our navy,
Our airforce . . .
We remember.

The very old, with heads and backs bent by time;
The middle-aged and the young, tall and strong, in active duty today;
And those whose ages are frozen in time forever--
We remember.

May we understand and honour their sacrifices.
May we be thankful for their lives.
May we try harder to love our fellow beings.
May we always remember.



courtesy of Pixabay


*****

Thanks for reading, my friends. See you on Friday. 





Friday 10 November 2017

Cooking, Crafts, And Cats

A collection of odds and ends today.

I've literally been out of the house only once since my trip to Emergency about my back. But I've been cooking real food for supper meals, which is good.

Maybe pizza isn't the best example of "real food" . . . but it's the only meal I thought to take a picture of


I worked on a few craft items that I can do while standing, because standing was more comfortable than sitting for quite a few days there, plus I have the chance to enter a couple more sales.

I don't make the vases, just the flowers. They are made with florist wire and buttons. I'm trying to decide if I need to make more flowers or if I'm just as bad at arranging fake flowers as I am real flowers, which is quite awful, really.



More of the same. These are fantasy flowers, so I can make them any colour I want. At least that's what I tell myself.


Vases still waiting for flowers. I admit that I have a thing for vases. And there are several of these I'd like to keep. All of them were bought at thrift stores, top price was $2, cheapest was 50 cents.



Maybe we should get the rest of the craft pictures out of the way while we're at it.

 

Draft blockers! Pictures requested by Joey! I'd already sold a couple before I remembered to take a picture. I sew the casings, which are fully lined, and stuff them with sliced-up fabric from worn out and out-of-style clothing.


In the process of filling a bag with chopped up old fabric, all cut with a pair of scissors. As always, I got a blister from using the scissors so much. If there's a better way, I haven't found it. I tried one of those rotary cutters, but it was hard to use, and I didn't feel safe. I'll stick with my blisters.


 And more things made with buttons:


. . . and empty wooden thread spools, bits of old Christmas cards, and (I confess) new beads and lace . . .


Closer, but somehow not all that much clearer . . .





Ho Ho Ho!


Christmas trees for your Christmas tree . . . what the? . . . but people buy them


Snowmen

Angels

Can you tell that I have a thing for buttons as well as vases??


One last picture, not craft-related! Our cats have been helping me stay mobile and limber as my pain retreats. They've both missed the litter box (which they never do otherwise) and they've both regurgitated their kibble at least twice each. I inch my way to my knees to clean up, and they peer over my shoulder to make sure I'm doing a good job. Then they wander off, apparently satisfied, to find a clean piece of upholstered furniture to sleep on. Meanwhile, I haul myself up using the nearest solid object. Not a cat. Some other solid object. It's a new form of physio, folks!

Not our cat, but the look is familiar. The look says, "You're a bit slow today, human. I hope there won't be any delays in getting my supper." Oh, they care; it's just buried really deeply inside :)

(photo from icanhas.cheezburger.com)


Hope you have a good weekend, folks, with lots of good eating, buttons to hold your clothes together, and pets who care :)