quiet

a weekend ... of silence

windows closed against the wind
blinds half drawn against the rain

duvet warm
tea hot


I read
I sleep ...
sometimes I dream

absolute

quiet.

oh crap

In spite of the warmth and sunshine that has brought a smile to my face, it has been a crap week.

It started with a flat tire. The spare, no less. It was still on the car from the other flat tire a couple of weeks ago while I waited to get snow tires put on. Luckily the regular tire had been easily 'plugged' and repaired as I had another flat the next day. A hunk of metal on the Gardiner, shredded it. Missed my appointment for that one. I am still waiting to get my car door fixed as the part that took 10 days to arrive did not fit and must be re-ordered. On the upside, at least it has been reasonably warm and not too rainy. But it's coming. Then last night whilst attempting to manoeuvre into a driveway, I scraped and dented the car door on some pointlessly placed and newly installed bricks surrounding a postage stamped size bit of lawn. The townhouse complex also has several dozen huge rocks lined up and the tenants are worried about their placement, too. The entrances and yards are all at ground level, so the bricks are for what purpose?

I realize that I have been experiencing increasing pain in my hands and fingers which may or may not be arthritis. And I have a very irritating hangnail on my thumb. Both of which makes both of my jobs ... painful.

Later, I stopped off at a store that shouldn't be selling groceries but does anyway and often has butter on special for almost half price. They didn't have butter, for half price or otherwise (strange?) but they did offer Ben&Jerry's for $2 off. Yep, Chunky Monkey came home with me. Yep, I ate the whole thing. All by myself.

And now, to round out the week, I will share with you that I have been 'tagged' from The Sagittarian who lives in New Zealand and usually has some very entertaining musical videos at the end of blog posts. She wants to know about my most embarrassing album purchase. Yes, I am of a certain age where there are many embarrassing 70's and even 80's songs that might have made it to my iPod playlist, if there'd been such a thing (which I still don't have) so there was a bit of cringing as I reached back into my memory...

While I also was among the throngs of teenage girls listening to The Osmonds, and The Jackson Five, and The Partridge Family (well, David Cassidy) I was not alone, so even though it is cringe-worthy now, and even was a little bit then, I was not alone, so nope none of those would be my most embarrassing choice. Though, unlike the Sagittarian's pick, I never got into Donny and Marie. That is embarrassing. I remember sometimes wishing as a teenager that I was more into edgier music, but I was attracted to the softer sounds. Folk was big. And so was country for a couple of years. And by country, I mean The Oak Ridge Boys. And Alabama. Okay, and Glen Campbell. But, I remember being really happy listening to them at the time, so that can't quite qualify as embarrassing.

No, the one that sticks in my mind as being the most useless piece of music I've ever owned (and quite possibly, if I check the box where I know there are some 45's nesting, still own) would have to be this choice (see below). I know I bought it in Scotland during my first or second visit when it was a huge obnoxious hit. And I know it brought back memories to many people when it was featured on an episode of Life On Mars - UK version (because many people on youtube commented so), but for the life of me --- what was I thinking?

You'll need to move down a post to witness the video, could not manage to get both on the same post, for some reason.

Because I want to share my pain, I invite Citizen of the World who educated us about ohrwurms or earworms (I prefer the German myself), XUP who must have a song or two in her past, Mr Nighttime who claims to be influenced by music, and just to get to know you better Jo to go back in time and expose your own personal humiliation. Anyone else who wants to play along, I'll not dissuade you.

Little Willy

being outdoors

Sorry, but today is just too sunny and un-November-like to be sitting inside. A patio is calling my name. I need to get out and play in the sunshine. Ride my bike. Kick a few leaves. Anything, any excuse, to be outdoors. Soon enough it will be November-like weather and we'll be sorry...

In the meantime, for those of you who are not experiencing this meteorological high, I send you off to read this story miwise posted the other day.

scroll down to yard work as viewed from heaven

more mail - postcards

From Ute - Germany From Stephanie - Delaware USA

From Silja - Finland

From Toby -Germany

Please, I need help with this uploading/downloading - this took forever and if you click on them you'll see that the images are ginormous, which is not what I wanted. These were uploaded using Microsoft Scanner and Camera Wizard and I cannot see how to make the image smaller. Should I be using something else?

UPDATE: Okay, I've figured out there is a resizing option on Microsoft Office Picture Manager where pictures can be compressed. I used to have photoshop and I didn't have this trouble before the 'crash'. But, if anyone knows of anything else, then by all means share.

you've got mail

Several months ago I came across a site called POSTCROSSING which intrigued me so much that I immediately signed up to participate. Then I promptly did nothing more about it. When I read one of Scott's posts about his cat Orlando's travelling postcards, it took a few moments before the vague memory dawned... ah, he has discovered Postcrossing too! So I immediately found the site and tried to log on. Except I had no idea what my username or password was. See, I need lovely organizing file folders for everything. A special folder for my usernames and passwords. Yeah, that should help. Anyway, I signed up again, taking forever to come up with a name that would be accepted - I guess a few hundred more people had signed up and taken all the good names. I guess I could have just gone with VioletSky, but I wanted something different. So now, my cat whose name has morphed into Absynthe, is sending mail throughout the world through the wonder of postcards. Finland seems to be seriously over-represented - out of my first five requests for an address, three were in Finland. My next three requests gave me two more from Finland. Sure hope Finns like postcards from Niagara.

This is how it works. You register and create your profile with as little or as much information as you wish, then request up to five addresses for your first mailing. You get a user ID number for each postcard and must write that number on your card. Once the recipient gets your card they register that ID number and your name goes into the lot for the next person who requests an address. Eventually you will be getting mail with foreign stamps and pretty pictures from all over the world - or at least of the 181 countries where people have signed up. Or Finland.

My first card arrived yesterday - exciting!!

It came from France, a place called Le Grand-Luce

.

Monday AMuse

remember

A day like today, usually finds me in a state of confusion. I have to check several clocks to find the real time - which ones have been moved back that hour, which ones need to be done manually. Far be it for me to be sensible and change them all the night before as is routinely suggested. Apparently my cell phone and computer and VCR are good. The microwave, stove and car are too lazy to do it themselves and need my help. Damn, twice a year I have to relearn how to reconfigure this.

Today is also a day of thinking about the departed. My culture is one that does not celebrate death, or the rituals of death. This is also partly my family custom. We have no grave sites for visiting. The one grandparent who was alive when I was born died when I was 10. My father did not have much to do with his family, my mother's family were all in Scotland and I was a teenager before I ever met any of them. Death was not a part of my family until recently. We have been rather fortunate for that, but also extremely unprepared. I was looking up some references for writing this, specifically an excellent production shown on PBS (POV: a Family Undertaking) about different death customs in various cultures and got sidetracked into reading many articles surrounding rites and rituals and ceremonies and how they have changed over the years and centuries. How much we have distanced ourselves from death and from the dying. In some way I wish we had a Day of the Dead. I wish we had a communal gathering to remember; a communal place to remember.

Today was a service for remembering at the seniors home where my mother moved into 2 years ago. There have been many deaths in that home during this year, including my mother and three of her close friends. A part of me did not want to go. Another part of me was glad to go. Glad to be a part of the service just by being present. Glad that there was a service. Glad that it was a beautiful November day for it. Glad that, when one wished to look away, there were still golden and yellow leaves hanging on some of the trees just beyond the large windows.

school daze

I will freely admit to being a little bit into house porn, though it is more the architecture that I admire than the decor. Not that I won't be found sitting in Chapters or Indigo with a coffee (even if it is, yech, Starbucks) and a slew of decorating magazines on a rainy afternoon perfect for dreaming... When I see a notice about OPEN HOUSE I take note. I'm always up for a nosey around an architecturally delightful building. So last weekend I wandered over to visit a Victorian school I had never heard of until I saw the article about it closing. I felt a little like an interloper among the many people reminiscing and looking at old photos as I'd never attended there, and it didn't really bring back memories of my elementary school as the one I went to was built in the 50's and was very different. (The photos don't reflect it, but there were a lot of people wandering about - I took these during the last 1/2 hour when it had quietened down.) Not having little kids around me any more, school is a foreign building. It has been many, many years since I was inside an educational institution, especially an elementary school. The original (!) tiny desks, the blackboards (not green ones, were they newer?) and the low water fountains - but sadly, not that big central circular sink that we used to have in the washrooms - were as they should be in my 1960's school days mind.

This is an example of one of the last Richardsonian Romanesque public buildings left in Hamilton. The school board is trying to close most of the urban schools and build more boring, uninspiring boxes for the students to commute to. What a way to make them love school. After an uproar from the community over it's proposed demolition, it will now be sold. It was declared an historical building so will not be torn down - though let us pray that it is not so neglected from disuse that it falls down as so many other historically important buildings have. It is hoped that it will be transformed into condos. And oh, what a lovely prospect that could be. Though, to be honest, it is not exactly in the most desirable area of town.

It was built in the late 1800's and 20 years later the school population had doubled in size so another building was built and attached by a long corridor.

The roof is made of slate - note the original tiles on the photo at right of the newer building.

Each building has 10 classrooms and they all open onto a large square foyer of gleaming, polished hardwood floors. There are numerous wide stairwells, each one different but with lovely wooden banisters and some marble floors.

It is a minor miracle that all of these original features are still intact, though admittedly, it does look a little worse for wear - but at its age, a well deserved wear!

The heating is probably not the most efficient, and there is no A/C, but there are so many huge windows in a design for maximum cross breezes. The attic even has usable space - 10' ceiling at it's lowest - and great views up the mountain.

If I'm still in the area and still blogging, I'll let you know the outcome, because you know I'll be heading for the condo tours!