Weekend musings

I have had a lovely Saturday so far for myself and have accomplished quite a bit considering I’ve enjoyed it. Between domestic duties of laundry out on the line (which loyal blog readers will remember as one of the few household tasks I DO enjoy) a loaf of brown bread which the bread maker and I created and walk about the estate grounds to pick up winter litter while checking the perennials which must be masochists as they have survived the rotten winter we’ve had in good form, it’s been a good start. I also got time to read the paper and walk the dog. There was an article in the newspaper about Deepak Chopra and his take on the recession (as difficult as it was for some) as a chance to examine where we are. He’s quoted as saying “we created a culture where we started to spend money that we hadn’t earned to buy things that we didn’t need to impress people that we didn’t like and it didn’t work anyway”.

Gary and Stanley, as you can see here spent the afternoon relaxing after an outing in the spring sunshine. Hard to believe they could fit both of themselves into this basket on my bureau; it would’ve been interesting contortions to watch.

I’m consoling myself as I finally had to admit this weekend that I just couldn’t fit all my plans in and had to give up on going to a writing workshop, which if I’d had different life I might have been able to make. It was a combination of the drive, not having anything written and simply not having enough hours in the day. One of these years.

Had a nice voice mail message from daughter # 2 this week chirping that she had received all A and A- marks in her Bachelor of Education program en francais. All this while working part time at the Montessori school, babysitting, volunteering as a teacher aide and keeping house in the apartment. Guess there’s no question of retaining the bursary due to her academic record.

This sister is presently in the process of retrieving the baby daughter from university residence after writing her last exam this morning so that she can be home for about 11 days before heading off to her clinical in Sweden. The Europe trip has been under negotiation (trust me CUPE doesn’t bargain this tough) with her father for the past week until he finally accepted her trip plan and gave her his visa number. The last update was that she was hoping to work at the local nursing home for the next few days while here to supplement her minimal stash. I’m expecting a rather full agenda, in addition to the regular daily activities as she is prepared and launched across the pond on April 30th. It will begin with arrival and laundry undoubtedly.

The western daughter is in the process of relocating across town and so in transit but she has been doing some research and discovered a government program, Life Long Learning Plan, where you can withdraw money from your RRSP's to use for school, and then repay it back all tax sheltered. It has to be full time studies but .. you have until you're 71!
http://www.cra-arc.gc.ca/tx/ndvdls/tpcs/rrsp-reer/llp-reep/cndtns/menu-eng.html
So as long as photography and writing programs are covered, I’m in.

She also made me really jealous by her plans to go so the dinosaurs in Drumheller this weekend. The Royal Terrell Museum is an amazing place and she has her camera batteries all charged up.

Speaking of cameras and all things photographic, I noticed while on vacation that the focus button was sticking on my lovely new camera and have been attempting to sort out how to access service as there’s a two year warranty and it was only purchased last fall but….the purchaser doesn’t believe in saving receipts (as that sort of task falls into the benefactor’s job description) so there’s no way to prove the warranty so I’ll attempt service when in the city. Likely a better option versus shipping, insuring and having someone practice on it at the Fuji center anyway. The biggest problem is that I don’t want to be without it for very long.

Well, time to enjoy the peace and quiet of the evening as the critters and lobstering men snooze. As per his plan, the man of the house is becoming more and more redundant on the boat as he spent the day doing a clinical for the heir to the fishing empire. He sat on the stern and ate his lunch as the boy and the hired man hauled the traps, said that was something he’d never done before - watch while someone else did his work. The intent is to switch the license around for the lad to go lobstering while he takes care of details on shore as things have accelerated with his new business venture he’s planning.

I had received a nice email from our out west friends to let us know they're going to be grandparents again. A daughter who previously had to resort to fertility treatments (leading to the descriptor that the first child was frozen for a year, now that's a story for the baby book) which are very costly both in resources and emotion has discovered herself pregnant again without any technical interventions. What a nice unexplainable surprise!